ARAPUNI PLANT.

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 234, 3 October 1934, Page 5

ARAPUNI PLANT.

CAPACITY INCREASE.

POWERHOUSE EXTENSIONS,

REMOVAL OF CUFF STARTED.

Men with ropes round them, and some with crowbars, have set to work to remove a clifT at Arapuni as the commencement of a scheme to make room for extensions to the powerhouse and increase the capacity output from GO,OOO k.w. to 90,000 k.w. About CO men have so far been engaged, many of them in loosening rhyolite rock from the face of the cliff. Others have been constructing concrete bins and railway lines.

It is expected that 100 men «*ill eventually be employed and the work will probably take two years.

The work of excavating the cliff, which is 100 ft high and contains over 30,000 cubic yards of rock, was suspended yesterday owing to the rain.

The. new powerhouse, which will be equally as large as the present power station, will adjoin the southern end of the present building. As the penstock tunnels for the two extra units that will be installed immediately the powerhouse is completed, were constructed with the other penstocks the building of this station will not require tha same amount of work as the previous station.

An attempt to carry out the excavations below the river bed level under dry conditions will be made by constructing a needle dam in the old river bed at the side of the powerhouse. The water behind this dam will then bo pumped out, and this, it is hoped, will make the excavation work easier.