By ashleykaren
The JV Acciona Ghella (AGJV) has granted the longest railway tunnel in the Nordics to this date, the Blix tunnel, to Bane NOR. The Blix tunnel is made up of 20 km of the Follo Line and is the first long Norwegian railway tunnel with two independent tunnel tubes. The tunnel is said to provide an adequate train service and cut the travel time between Oslo and Ski to approximately half.
The tunnel will be a critical connection in the InterCity development southeast of Oslo and is designed and constructed by Acciona and Ghella on behalf of Bane NOR. The project marks the end of the work, which continued for seven years. As reported, the tunnel will be operational as early as December 2022.
The train capacity between Oslo and Ski will double with double tracks and a maximum speed of 250 km/h. In addition, it will relieve the travel time between Ski and Oslo from 22 to 11 minutes.
The AGJV has operated intentionally to cut CO2 emissions in the project. The JV has reduced more than 27,000 tons of CO2 emissions by adopting world-leading technology, new solutions and good interaction with local partners.
The Follo Line was the first tunnel project in Norway to be worked with using four large, double-shield hard rock TBMs. The machines have made it attainable to construct two distinct tunnel tubes boring from 4 individual points- both of which have an excavation diameter of 9.9 meters and a length of 19.5 kilometers. Acciona and Ghella collaboratively developed the tunnel boring machines for this specific project.
