E.ON base plate
Customer
E.On MPP3 is an organization established by E.On GmbH to construct the MPP3 power plant at the Maasvlakte Rotterdam, the Netherlands. The Quality department of E.On MPP3 hired SGS INTRON to assist them in assessing and minimizing the risk for all concrete construction works.
Case
One of the high risk parts is the base plate of the power plant. This massive concrete base plate of 2.5 to 4 meters thick covers an area of about two soccer fields. 27.000m3 of concrete was needed to construct this base plate. It is the largest base plate ever to be built in the Netherlands and the second largest in the world. The objective for the contractor was to cast this base plate without cold joints. In order to achieve and assure the flow of concrete needed for this four concrete batching plants were installed on site. Two temporary batching plants for the base plate and two temporary batching plants for the entire project.
Given the size of the project some of the risks are excessive heat development, cracks due to temperature gradients, cold joints, segregation, cracking due to subsidence etc.
Solution
SGS INTRON assisted the QA/QC department in general and the QA/QC manager especially in the management of the risks (technical and managerial) involved in the project. Some of the activities were assessing work method statements for the concreting, recommending improvements, signalizing risks, quantifying risks and recommending mitigation measures. One of the services required by the customer was inspection of the entire production process (mixing, transport, placing, compacting, finishing and curing) and inspection of the concrete quality. For this purpose SGS INTRON assigned several inspectors and organised and manned an onsite laboratory. The concreting of the base plate finally took 6 days, 24 hours a day.
Finally SGS INTRON provided a summarizing and detailed report with recommendations regarding future projects and a recommendation regarding acceptance or rejection of the base plate. The latter was a specific question of the customer.