Mumbai: The long-standing water shortage in areas administered by the City and Industrial Development Corporation (CIDCO) is expected to be resolved soon, as work on the Hetawane Water Supply Scheme gains momentum. In a historic achievement, CIDCO is set to record its first-ever tunnel breakthrough across all its projects by next week.
CIDCO set to achieve its first-ever tunnel breakthrough milestone
The milestone is part of the Augmentation of the Hetawane Water Supply Scheme, an ambitious initiative undertaken to meet the increasing water demand of fast-growing areas in Navi Mumbai. Senior CIDCO officials said the project has progressed despite extreme geological and engineering challenges.
The scheme involves the construction of a 13.25-kilometre raw water tunnel and a 15.4-kilometre treated water tunnel. Once completed, it will significantly enhance CIDCO’s water supply capacity from the current 120 million litres per day (MLD) to 270 MLD, benefiting residential, commercial, and industrial zones in the region.
Breakthrough planned at Wahal village under Water Tunnel Package-1
The tunnel breakthrough will take place at Shaft-4 at Wahal village under CIDCO’s Water Tunnel Package-1. Afcons Infrastructure Ltd is executing the package, which includes the construction of an 8.7-kilometre treated water tunnel. So far, 5.52 kilometres of tunnelling work has been completed.
According to officials, the tunnelling work is being carried out nearly 100 metres below ground and passes through complex geological formations, including Amygdaloidal basalt in the Deccan Sahyadri region. The project also faced severe space constraints affecting equipment setup and manoeuvrability. Additionally, mucking using muck car arrangements proved to be one of the most critical operations. These challenges were successfully addressed through close coordination between CIDCO engineers and the Afcons technical team.
Earlier in the project, Afcons set a new national tunnelling record by achieving 777 metres of tunnelling in a single month using the 3.2-metre-diameter Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM) Flamingo, surpassing its previous record of 714 metres achieved in May this year.
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