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Ameren Missouri has nearly completed its $53 million project to improve the safety of its Bagnell Dam on the Osage River in Missouri.
The utility reports that construction crews have poured the final yards of concrete and are completing finishing touches. The project involved installation of a series of anchors and concrete on the downstream side of the dam to improve overall safety, efficiency and reliability of the 85-year-old structure.
Ameren Missouri says the project is finishing ahead of schedule. Initial work, including the removal of warn concrete from the surface of the dam, began in March 2017. Crews then installed 67 post-tensioned anchors, strengthening the concrete to bedrock. More than 66 million pounds of new concrete was poured to further weigh down the dam.
Bagnell Dam houses Ameren Missouri’s 242.59-MW Osage Energy Center. In 2017, it produced more than 624,000 MWh of energy, supplying about 52,000 homes.
“For nearly a century, the Bagnell Dam has reliably powered homes and businesses across the region,” said Warren Witt, director of hydro operations at Ameren Missouri. “These upgrades ensure the dam will continue to be a top producer of clean, renewable energy for Missouri’s communities for the next 100 years.”
Witt says the dam work helped drive local economic development, with more than 220 construction jobs created for the local trades and vendors to the Osage area in the first 16 months of the project. The project translated to an estimated $50 million impact on the area through additional spending.
Missouri-based MC Industrial was the on-site general contractor for the project.
The last major structural upgrade at Bagnell Dam was completed in the early 1980s with the installation of 277 post-tensioned anchors to hold the dam into the bedrock, Ameren Missouri reports.
Ameren Missouri provides electric and gas service to more than 1.2 million electric and 130,000 natural gas customers in central and eastern Missouri.
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