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Tunnel Vision:

looking to the future

Thanks to the imagination and enterprise of a North East mechanical engineer with an interest in tunnelling technology, it is conceivable that North Sea oil platform construction technology could finally make possible the construction of the world's biggest and most valuable tunnel.

The tunnel in question is a long-dreamed of link between two of the world's leading economies, Japan and Korea under the Sea of Japan . The two Asian powerhouses could theoretically be linked by a tunnel roughly 200 kilometers long (four times the length of the Channel Tunnel), but the idea has been languishing on the drawing boards since it was first mooted away back in 1939 as a highly-efficient transport link between two of the Axis powers then limbering up for war.

The peacetime benefits have been revived intermittently since the 1980s, and the attractions are increasingly obvious - freighting from Japan or Korea to Europe could be reduced from its current six weeks to two via the Trans-Siberian railway.

Unfortunately, the difficulties are equally impressive. Although there are three possible routes, each would take at least 15 years to tunnel and cost up to £50,000 million.

Unless, that is, Aberdeen-based engineer Allan Sharp manages to convince the two governments that by applying tried and trusted North Sea platform technology, the tunnelling time could be slashed to around five or six years, with equally dramatic cost savings for the giant project.

A simple concept

Allan, managing director of local engineering company Axtech Ltd, has patented his simple concept and won support from Mott McDonald, the international civil engineering giants who were principal design consultants on the UK section of the Channel Tunnel.

As with the best ideas, his concept is beautifully simple. Rather than have only two tunnelling teams working from each end of the 200 km dig, Allan proposes utilising a number of intermediate subsea shafts accessed via giant concrete caissons similar in design to early North Sea oil platforms.

"The technology to land and fix giant concrete caissons on the seabed is tried and tested in the North Sea - but not in Japan or Korea , which, by comparison, have no significant deepwater offshore engineering expertise," explains Allan.

"But it would be relatively straightforward to drill from the caissons into the seabed and from these interim positions deploy additional tunnel-boring machines for simultaneous operations - and this would totally transform the viability of the project.

"Tunnel waste could be removed much more quickly if you had a number of egress points, and, once the tunnel is completed, the structures would be permanently retained as emergency exits/access points to the tunnel below."

Heading for the lobby

The potential implications for major technology transfer from the North Sea to a brand new Asian market are self-evident, so Allan has been able to receive valuable support from Scottish Enterprise Grampian to start the lobbying process.

During the summer, Allan and Gareth Mainwaring, Principal Tunnelling Engineer with Mott McDonald, delivered a technical paper at a major civil engineering conference in Seoul , where their revolutionary concept was well received.

"Once the Asian audience had been convinced of the reality of deepwater concrete caissons - and they had obviously never seen anything like the huge North Sea structures which are now commonplace to us - it was obvious that we had instantly become an important new player in a large, very complex economic debate," he reports.

"There will be many years ahead of intensive lobbying, not just from the technical point of view, but also looking at possible routes, resistance to earthquakes and impact on the Korean ports.

"But I obviously have the courage of my commitments, and Mott McDonald, which is completely onside, is a highly-influential global company with strong connections in both Japan and Korea - so let's now see what the studies come up with."

In the 19th century, it was the vision of a North East entrepreneur, Thomas Blake Glover, that built the might of the Japanese navy. Could it just be possible that history is going to repeat itself? The potential prize for the oil construction industry makes it all an extremely pleasant prospect.