In May, Big Becky made her final breakthrough after a lengthy 10.6km drive beneath Niagara Falls. With this milestone, the mega project is one major step closer to completion. But that’s not to say the market for tunnelling in Canada will feel a void.

Beneath the city of Toronto there is a hotbed of activity. Subway, LRT and sewer lines are being constructed, or they will be soon. Looking across the nation, it’s a similar story in all major Canadian cities.

In British Columbia, the province is working toward a goal to achieve energy self-sufficiency by 2016, and hydropower is a major player for this goal. The tunneling industry will reap the benefits here as well.

With the government backing or in some ways indirectly pushing these projects forward, the benefits are obvious, but it also changes the nature of the work being bid. Don Brophy, senior vice president of Aecon Constructors, a heavy civil construction firm based in Toronto, says the market has been more consistent than in years, but the work is trending toward public-private-partnerships (PPP) and design-build contracts in the hydropower sector.

“Public-private-partnerships give us a good opportunity to strengthen our areas of joint venture partnership,” he explains. “For instance, with larger projects we always want a good joint venture partner to check estimates with and risks and so on.”

Transit
Since the beginning of the year, Toronto has seen excavations start on the Toronto-York Spadina Subway line extension’s southern tunnel package. A second TBM is at the portal ready to start excavations, Brophy confirms. Aecon is the general contractor on the southern part of the extension. For the tunnelling portion of the project it is in a joint venture with Kiewit and McNally.

A contractor for the northern tunnels was awarded in January to a joint venture of Obrascon Huarte Lain (OHL)/Fomento de Construcciones y Contratas (FCC). Two more owner-procured TBMs produced by CAT will be used for this part of the project. Chief project manager with the Toronto Transit Commission, Andy Bertolo says, “In all, the four units will excavate more than 12km of running tunnels for the subway extension, which is scheduled for completion in late 2015.”

Head over to Eglinton Avenue and construction is underway for the first launch box on the Eglinton-Scarborough Crosstown LRT line. By this time next year another TBM will be mining its way through the soft ground of Toronto, with at least three more waiting in the wings.

A design-build contract is expected to be bid early 2012 for the first section of twin tunnels. There are 19km of tunnels in total that need to be completed for the line by 2020, increased this spring from the 11km originally planned (see page 16). Metrolinx, an agency for the province of Ontario and the owner of the project, is still designing the line and how the tunnelling contracts will be divided.

Ottawa is planning the Downtown LRT project, which includes a 3.2km-long tunnel to be excavated as deep as 40m below ground. The City of Ottawa issued an RFQ in July from qualified firms and consortia due in September. A short list of qualified respondents is expected this month, and the RFP process is expected to last nine months with a final contract to be signed by December 2012.

In Vancouver the Evergreen Line, estimated to cost CAD 1.4bn (USD 1.34bn), will run for 11km connecting Coquitlam to Vancouver via Port Moody and Burnaby, with 2km underground. Construction was originally anticipated to start this year, once regional funding had been set in place. This month regional mayors will vote on a supplemental plan to fund the project, among others. The RFP is likely to be awarded in 2012 with an estimated construction period of four years.

Hydro
Hydropower is the predominant form of generating electricity in Canada. Nearly two-thirds of power generated each year uses this process, according to Natural Resources Canada, the ministry responsible for natural resources, energy, minerals and metals, and forests, among other sectors. Opportunities for tunnelling come from both government power authorities and private power developers.

Hydro-Quebec is building the 1,550MW La Romaine hydroelectric complex on the Riviere Romaine in the Cote-Nord region of Quebec. Average annual production on the CAD 6.5bn (USD 6.3bn) project is anticipated to power more than 450,000 households.

The Romaine Two intake tunnel is being excavated by drill and blast by Simard Beaudry, who was awarded the downstream section in April 2010, and the intake section later in June of the same year. Simard Beaudry is currently working on the top heading and is now sinking the upper portion of the 32m diameter surge shaft, which will be 62m deep.

BC Hydro, an electric utility based out of British Columbia, is constructing the Northwest Transmission Line (NTL), an approximately 344km, 287kV line to be completed before the end of 2013.

With its investment comes future hydro projects that will tap into the transmission line. Currently AltaGas, an energy infrastructure company, is constructing Forrest Kerr, a 195MW run-of-river hydroelectric project, which includes 4,500m of tunnelling being undertaken by contractor Procon. This is the first of three power generation projects AltaGas has planned in the area.

For the John Hart Generating Station Replacement project, estimated to cost as much as CAD 1.35bn (USD 1.31bn), BC Hydro is looking at replacing 1.8km of pipelines with an 8m diameter tunnel 2km long and constructing a replacement generating station and water bypass facility. At the moment, three woodstave and steel pipelines of 12ft (3.7m) diameter carry water from the John Hart Reservoir and Dam to the generating station. These pipelines are not capable of withstanding moderate or higher seismic activity.

The project, located on Vancouver Island, is scheduled to begin the procurement process in late 2011, with the contract awarded winter 2012/2013.

The tunnelling market has been fairly consistent, and it looks to stay that way, Brophy says. “The governments are always coming up with a large list of projects, but by the time they get out to tender they get spread out over a number of years,” he explains. “For the next few years, we’re going to see that there are a number of interesting projects to go after.”


One of the TBMs for the Toronto-York Spadina Subway extension in Toronto The John Hart Dam and existing pipelines, which are to be replaced by an 8m diameter rock tunnel