Nord Stream 2: Wasco Starts Concrete Pipe Coating in Finland Base
Nord Stream 2 AG’s contractor Wasco has started concrete weight coating of the pipes needed for the natural gas pipeline through the Baltic Sea in its pipe coating plant in Kotka, Finland.
Almost half of the 200,000 pipes needed for the entire project will be concrete weight coated in Wasco’s plant located in the Port of HaminaKotka.
Coating for the Nord Stream 2 project provides work for 195 persons. During the peak production period, it will employ up to 300 persons directly and approximately 100 persons indirectly for various operations, such as plant maintenance, storage and port operations, which should continue in Kotka until late 2018.
To date Wasco’s Kotka storage yard has received over 35,000 pipes from the pipe mills. Once the pipes have been coated with concrete, part of them will be stored in Wasco’s storage yard directly in Kotka, and the rest will be transhipped to another storage yard in Koverhar, Hanko in Finland. During construction, coated pipes will be fed from the storage yards to the pipe-lay vessels.
Concrete weight coating increases the stability of the pipeline on the seabed, as the concrete doubles to 24 tonnes the weight of each 12 metre, 48-inch diameter pipe joint. Coating also protects the pipes from external damage when they are stored, transported and eventually lowered on to the seabed.
