Upper Kaleköy Dam and HEPP

The Upper Kaleköy Dam, with its hydroelectric power plant, is located on the Murat River which flow throughs outskirts of Bingöl city in eastern Türkiye.

The project embodied the construction of an roller-compacted-concrete (RCC) gravity dam, which is 150 meters tall from the foundation and has a crest length of 535 meters. It includes an overflow spillway controlled by 4 radial gates with a total discharge capacity of 8,800 m³/s. About 850,000 m³ of soil was excavated on the left abutment, and more than 220,000 m³ of conventional vibrated concrete (CVC) was utilized to build the separated spillway.

Approximately 1,968,000 m³ of stripping excavation carried out for the dam and abutments to achieve a sound rock foundation. Nearly a volume of 2,340,000 m³ of RCC was laid in 2 years to form the main dam, as well as 182,000 m³ of conventional vibrated concrete (CVC) was used for a frontal water intake, which constitutes an integral part of the RCC structure

The river diversion scope consists of two circular tunnels and upstream/downstream cofferdams with a roller-compacted-concrete (RCC) volume of 35,000 m³. The parallel tunnels have a longitudinal length of 846 meters and 951 meters respectively. An excess of 125,000 m³ of earth and rocks were excavated along these tunnels to reach their external diameter of 11 meters using conventional tunneling methods. They were concrete lined to an internal diameter of 9.5 meters respectively.

The power plant, which is positioned at the base of the dam, the construction involved a volume of 497,000 m³ of earthwork, and 145,000 m³ of concrete (CVC) for its erection.

In the contract, the project scope also covered the installation of four (4) vertical axis Francis turbine, and generator units as well as a 400kV switch-yard. The output of three (3) units is 199.4 MW each, and one (1) small unit is rated at 28.65 MW, with a total power capacity of 626.85 MW.

Cengiz Construction Company, and its joint venture (JV) lead partner Özaltın Construction Company, delivered to Kalehan Energy Company, all civil works six months earlier than the contractual requirement and within the planned budget. The project started in 2012, and completed in 2018.