Located in the lower course of Jinsha River, Wudongde Hydraulic Power Station is one of the six power stations along Jinsha River. Wudongde Hydraulic Power station is the fourth in China, and seventh in the world to have the capacity over tens of millions of kilowatt. The station is currently under full speed construction. The normal water level is designed as 975 meters. It is expected that the station will begin its operation and generate electrical power in the year of 2020. The whole capacity doubles that of Three Gorges Dam.

The investment of Wudongde Hydraulic Power Station is over 100 billion RMB. The project is constructed by China Three Gorges Corporation. As the key source of electrical power for the West-to-East Electricity Transmission Project, the station mainly functions as a power station, with secondary function of flood control and shipping.

The geological situation at the construction site is quite complicated due to its deep valleys, and the slope height on both sides of the river is between 1500 and 1800 meters. The grade of side slope is between 60°and 70°. Deep pit combined with high cofferdam is one of the largest technical challenges during the project. The foundation depth of the cofferdam is between 55 meter and 77 meters. The maximum depth of cutoff walls reaches 95 meters, the highest ever in similar projects nationwide.

At midnight of March 16th, 2017, the first batch of concrete was poured into the eighth dam segment in the construction site of Wudongde Power Station, announcing the turning point from earth excavation to concrete cast.

The dam will experience 40 months of intensive concrete casting until June 2020, when the concrete cast will be finished at the top of the dam.

It is known that the foundation of Wudongde Dame is 51 meters deep, and the depth to height ratio as low as 0.19. It is the thinnest among 300-meter-long arch dams worldwide, with complicated structural loading conditions. Concrete casting is required to be of high quality. The concrete casting is quite intensive, with the peak level of 951 thousand square meters per year. At the most intensive situation, workers have to cast about 100 thousand square meters of concrete in one month.

During the construction of the power station, about 70 thousand employment will be created annually. After its construction, the local finance will increase by about 1350 million RMB.

A series of technical challenges have been solved during the construction of Wudongde Hydraulic Power Station. In the near future, a dome dam will be erected and attract attentions from all over the world.