Planning on Snowy Hydro 2.0 nears completion as bosses reveal underground challenges

TEN million cubic metres of rock — enough to fill the MCG six times over — will have to be dug out of the Snowy Mountains to build a new pumped hydro scheme.

TEN million cubic metres of rock — enough to fill the MCG six times over — will have to be dug out of the Snowy Mountains to build a new pumped hydro scheme.

More than 200 people are working on a feasibility study for Snowy Hydro 2.0, with those in charge saying they are confronting challenging underground conditions.

TURNBULL FAST-TRACKS SNOWY SCHEME

SNOWY COSTS COULD DOUBLE

Test drilling a kilometre underground has begun in a dozen areas to help guide the plan to build more than 17km of tunnels through the Snowy Mountains.

Engineers will also have to built a cavern that is 200m long, 50m wide and 30m high to house a giant new hydro-electric power station.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull during a visit to Snowy Hydro in Cooma. Picture: Alex Ellinghausen

But no decision has been made on where to dump the huge amount of rock, which will mainly be broken through by tunnel boring machines, along with some blasting.

A Senate inquiry heard construction on Snowy Hydro 2.0 was tipped to start by the end of next year, with up to 6000 jobs created during the estimated six-year life of the project.

Snowy Hydro chief executive Paul Broad said the hydro company had been valued at $8-$10 billion as the Federal Government continued discussions to buy out the stakes of Victoria and New South Wales.

Asked when that process would finish, Mr Broad said “the sooner the better”, and that the states had engaged their own consultants to value their share. Victoria owns 29 per cent of the scheme.

Mr Broad said engineers had so far encountered “a lot of issues” testing different rock types along the proposed tunnel route.

The project has been initially priced at $2 billion but Mr Broad said the cost not be confirmed until the feasibility study was delivered to the Snowy Hydro board in December.

There will also be substantial extra costs to upgrade power transmission lines to and from the scheme.

[e-mail]

Twitter: @tminear