New layouts of pumped-storage stations

Conclusions

• 1. The design of PSSs in the European sector of the USSR for heads of 100–180 m requires an approach to a number of design and construction decisions having a direct effect on the environment, time of starting up the power facilities, and effectiveness of construction such that it would be possible to avoid constructing PSS powerhouses in large open pits with longoperating groundwater-lowering systems, undercutting the slopes (which, as a rule, are slidehazardous), placement of penstocks on them, and long construction time before start-up of the first unit, which are related with a substantial immobilization of capital investments.

• 2. Among the layouts of PSSs, the variants of locating the units in individual shafts with tunnel conduits or in open shafts, which considerably reduce expenditures in the startup complexes due to reducing the volumes of works and expanding the area of use of hydraulicking means, and also the use of support of the tunnel-type penstocks by precast reinforced-concrete blocks and stabilization of cuts by structures of the diaphragm wall type can be considered quite prospective.