The last unit of GE Renewable Energy’s Wudongde (WDD) hydropower plant has been successfully linked to the grid for electricity generation and has completed 72 hours of trial operation. The company was responsible for the design, engineering, manufacture, installation monitoring, and commissioning of the six 850 MW Francis turbine generating sets and accompanying equipment for the hydropower project under a contract signed in 2015.
These are among the world’s biggest units ever utilised in a hydroelectric project, with a combined capacity of 850 MW. In July 2020, the first unit was linked to the grid. A single unit of this type is estimated to be capable of powering the equivalent of 1.8 million average Chinese households.
WDD is already the China Three Gorges Corporation (CTG) and GE Renewable Energy’s third collaborative large-scale national energy infrastructure project on a national scale. The Three Gorges Project was linked to the grid in 2008, and the Xiangjiaba hydropower project was finished in 2014. The WDD hydropower facility, with a total installed capacity of 10,200 MW, is located in the lower sections of the Jinsha River. The power plant is an important component in China’s West-East Power Transmission project, in which the country is developing power resources in the west and sending energy to provinces in the east that are short on power.
The clean energy produced by the WDD hydropower project is expected to save roughly 12.2 million of conventional coal. Similarly, the power plant is anticipated to cut CO2 emissions by 30.5 million tonnes and SO2 emissions by 104,000 tonnes. In order to complete the project, GE Renewable Energy increased local hydropower capacity in China. Among other things, the project was overseen from the company’s site in Tianjin, China, where the majority of the components were also made.