Work on the shipping lock and spillway dam continues at the Bagayevsky hydroelectric complex

As part of the construction of the Bagayevsky hydroelectric complex, one of the largest transportation infrastructure facilities in the Rostov region, work is underway on the upper and lower heads of the lock. The Project is executed by Stroytransgaz Group of Companies.

The Bagaevsky Hydroelectric Complex is designed to address the navigation bottleneck on the Lower Don, providing the necessary dimensions of the waterway. This goal will be achieved by means of the dams and shipping lock currently under construction, which are part of the hydroelectric complex. Herewith, the river will have different water levels. The lock will ensure passage of the vessels (the so called “lockage”) between the river sections with different water levels.

Double lane, single chamber lock of the Bagaevsky Hydroelectric Complex includes chambers and mooring and guiding facilities. The lock itself consists of three main elements: the upper head, the lower head, and the lock chamber, which is its middle part with gates at the ends. It is in the chamber that the ship passes from one water level to another by filling or emptying the lock chamber through special waterway galleries. But before that, the lock chamber must be completely isolated from the upstream and downstream sections using gates. Work is nearing completion at the construction site prior to concreting the upper and lower heads of the lock. The head of the lock is where the gates are located and where changes in water levels occur.

Concreting of the spillway dam sections with a total length of 307 meters is in progress. The dam is designed to pass floods and regulate navigational water discharges. Currently, 5 of the 12 sections of the dam foundation have been concreted. About 13.5 thousand cubic meters of concrete were used.

The Federal State Unitary Enterprise Rostransmodernizatsiya is the state customer of the project.

Project background:

The Bagayevsky Hydroelectric Complex is the most important infrastructure project not only for Rostov Region, but also for the whole country. The hydroelectric complex under construction will be composed of a shipping lock with a central control room, upper and lower approach channels with mooring-guiding structures, a spillway and earth fill dam, a meandering fish bypass and spawning channel and a fish passage lock, industrial, service, engineering and auxiliary facilities, and housing for operating personnel. To ensure the navigation safety, channel-regulating dams are being constructed, as well as shore protection dams that will prevent the development of bank erosion processes (washout and collapse), protect from the impact of ship waves and reduce the negative impact of waters on the population living in these areas. In order to ensure guaranteed waterway dimensions (depth – 4 m, width – 80 m, bending radius – 500 m) in the section from the Kochetovsky Hydroelectric Complex site at km 3004.5 of the waterway of the Integrated Deep Water System (IDWS) to the Bagaevsky Hydroelectric Complex site at km 3089 of the IDWS waterway, dredging and river cut-off are envisaged.