Crews continue to prepare the Big Bend site in south Burnaby for a new B.C. Hydro substation.
The substation is being built on Byrne Road between Marine Way and North Fraser Way. Since the site is in the flats near the Fraser River, it cannot be stabilized using traditional pile driving because there is no bedrock to support the piles, according to a media release. That’s when deep soil mixing comes in, a process that involves injecting a special concrete mixture deep into the ground and mixing it with soil to form soil-concrete pillars. Burnaby-based Pacific Ground Engineering has being getting the site ready since May.
Construction of the $56-million substation, which will have much of the equipment housed in two buildings, will start sometime this fall, the release read.
“The forecast at the moment is that the demand in the area (will) increase by more than 20 per cent over the next 10 years,” B.C. Hydro’s Lesley Wood told the NOW. “That area is a big commercial light industrial area; a lot of people moving in there.”
Right now, Big Bend receives electricity from a substation located at Kingsway and Griffiths Avenue.
“It’s getting to the point where it can’t supply more electricity and there’s no room to put in new equipment there,” Wood added.
B.C. Hydro will also be building a park on the property that will be accessible to the public.
Electricity at Big Bend should be flowing by April of 2017.
