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PENNSYLVANIA — Its sheer size is overwhelming — 825 tons, 53 feet long, 17 feet wide, and 24 feet high. The 825-ton super-load transport, comprised of two new 510-ton, enhanced once-through steam generators — manufactured by AREVA — traveled 75 miles on land to the Three Mile Island Generating Station (TMI) in Dauphin County, Pa. The replacement steam generators are an integral part of a $300-million investment Exelon is making in the TMI Unit 1 reactor to extend the plant’s operations for decades to come. The super-load transport took 3 weeks starting in Port Deposit, Md., and travelled through four counties and 17 municipalities in Maryland and Pennsylvania before arriving at TMI.

There are not a lot of roads, bridges, or stream crossings designed to handle 825 tons so AREVA partnered with several world-class companies to complete this delivery. Michael Baker, Jr., Inc. provided engineering services; Kinsley Construction, Inc. was responsible for all infrastructure construction and reinforcement; Oldcastle Precast provided the concrete pipe and Fagioli, Inc. transported the two units. Special recognition goes to Ron Brown of Kinsley Construction who was very instrumental in making this project a great success.

This was the most challenging large-piece delivery for all involved. Delivering these generators required complex logistics involving government and regulatory agencies in two states and numerous local communities and authorities.

The super-load transport was accomplished by utilizing overbridges (30’, 50’ & 80’) for many of the 51 crossings. In some cases, additional steel would be added to the existing structures to accommodate the extreme loads, or the structures would be shored using towers or screw jacks.

When there were no other options, bridge bypasses were built using Oldcastle Precast’s Reinforced Concrete Pipe from its Croydon facility.

“To the best of my knowledge this is the first time our pipe has been used for this specific type of project and it performed flawlessly,” said Ed Pentecost, regional sales manager for Oldcastle Precast in Folsom. Overall there were 16 sites along the route that required an engineering solution to accommodate this tremendous load. Oldcastle Precast supplied 1,700 feet of 48-inch, CL-4 reinforced concrete pipe to this project. The pipe was used on the bridge bypasses to allow water to continue to flow through the temporary roads constructed to carry the generators. The composite of materials for the reinforced concrete pipe made for an extremely strong structure but at the same time was porous enough to allow for the passage of water through the structure and showed absolutely no signs of stress or failure, certainly making concrete pipe the right choice for this job.

Overall, the project required creative engineering solutions to accommodate this tremendous load and the use of reinforced concrete pipe to complete the bridge bypasses without doubt contributed to the success of the project.

For more information, visit www.oldcastleprecast.com.