The equipment to excavate the five kilometre tunnel between Magħtab terminal station and Pembroke distribution centre in preparation for the interconnector linking Malta to the European grid has arrived, Enemalta said this morning.

The machine arrived in Malta yesterday and will be unloaded and transported on site today where it will then be assembled.

The tunnel boring machine has been deployed on various projects around Europe including in Italy, Spain and Switzerland, where it was used by CERN to dig the accelerator tunnel.

It is 77 meters long and weighs 280 tonnes. It and excavates tunnels with a circular cross section through a variety of soil and rock strata. It can bore through anything from hard rock to sand and can dig between 30 and 50 meters in 20 hours.

The machine will be deployed on the tunnel which will start from the terminal station and intersect into a tunnel that is currently being built between Kappara DC and Pembroke, connecting to Enemalta’s high voltage grid.

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