TEC (Tunnel Engineering Consultants) together with an international consortium, will advise the Chinese government during the design and construction of a 35 km long bridge/tunnel combination in the south of China, which will form the connection between the important Chinese economic centres of Hong Kong, Macao and the Chinese mainland. The project, in the delta of the “Pearl river”, comprises a series of conventional bridges and cable bridges, a number of islands to be newly created and a 6 km immersed tunnel. The design is already in full swing and construction is to begin at the end of this year. The intention is for the connection to be put into service at the end of 2015. One of the main challenges for this project is the scope.
The consortium, which is comprised of American and Chinese engineering agencies and TEC (a permanent joint venture between Royal Haskoning, DHV and Witteveen + Bos), will provide international expertise in  the design and realisation of immersed tunnels and new construction of islands. TEC has gained experience in the Netherlands with HSL tunnels under the Oude Maas and Dordtsche Kil, the Groene Hart tunnel and the Noord and Wijker tunnels, and internationally with the Øresund in Denmark, Busan Geoje in South Korea, the Medway tunnel in the United Kingdom and the Coatzacoalcos tunnel in Mexico. The selection of the consortium was partly based on this experience and expertise.
The consortium will provide the Chinese project organisation with advice in the field of design, implementation, sustainability, costs, planning, management and maintenance throughout the entire project. This project will run until after 2015.
TEC has been involved in the project since the beginning. Along with the American partner it has been conducting the assessment of the conceptual design of the bridges, tunnel and islands, which was created by a Chinese agency with the support of other international parties.
In another consortium, TEC is also providing consultancy services in the Fehmarnbelt tunnel project, the 19 km immersed road/rail tunnel between Germany and Denmark.