Americas News
Panama Canal Expansion Over 90% Complete
After seven years of construction, a new video released by Panama Canal authorities says the canal's expansion project is now 91 percent complete.
Work on the third set of locks, said to be the project's most complex portion, is now focused on electro-mechanical installation that will take the project into its final stage.
The expansion will see the installation of 16 rolling gates into the lock heads, as well as the installation of 152 valves that will move the water through the system.
The expansion is also said to feature "water-saving basins", which will save an estimated 7 percent water usage in operations compared to the current locks.
Three dams are being added at the north end of the canal, one of which is now complete, while the remaining two are said to be in the final stages of construction.
The compliance and operation testing period is reported to have begun earlier this year, when the already completed locks were first filled with water.
Another two portions of the canal expansion that are also nearing completion include the Pacific Access Channel 4, which is 91 percent complete, as well as a project to raise Gatun Lake's water level, which is said to be 96 percent complete and adds an additional 200 million cubic metres of water to the canal's reservoir supply for operations.
In June, The Boston Consulting Group (BCG) said that the completion of the Panama Canal expansion could mean as much as 10 percent of East Asia container traffic currently going to the U.S. West Coast would switch to East Coast ports by 2020.
