Another big lift for Big Carl at HPC

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Sarens’ 5,000 tonne capacity SGC-250 (aka Big Carl) has completed another major lift at the Hinkley Point C jobsite in the UK.

It has placed the first huge steel ring section onto the second reactor building, just 11 months after carrying out the same operation on the first reactor.

According to EDF, the power company building the nuclear reactor, the installation shows how building an identical copy of the first reactor drives efficiency and saves time. The ring was built 25% more quickly than the same part on unit one, requiring thousands of hours less labour to manufacture. It says this ‘replication effect’ will also benefit the identical Sizewell C project in Suffolk. The prefabricated ring, which is 47 metres in diameter and 17 metres high, forms a reinforced cylinder around the nuclear reactor.

 EDF said the achievement is all the more impressive as the project deliberately switched materials and labour away from unit two during the pandemic when numbers on site were limited and suppliers were impacted. This allowed work to focus on areas most critical to the project’s schedule. The optimum construction time between the two reactors at Hinkley Point C is around 12 months and this installation highlights this gap is being maintained.

Simon Parsons, NI Area, site & civils director, said, “This significant lift is testament to everyone involved – from the teams who fabricated it, to those on Unit 2 who’ve delivered the civil-works schedule enabling us to install it and also the lifting team themselves. We have continued to learn from Unit 1 to safely deliver a quality product.”