Norway is about to tunnel a shipping lane through a mountain
AF Gruppen wins the NOK 5.6bn contract to build the world's first ship tunnel at Stad, giving year-round safe passage.
The Norwegian Coastal Administration has awarded a contract to AF Gruppen for the engineering and construction of the Stad Ship Tunnel, the world's first ship tunnel.
The project comprises a fully equipped tunnel for maritime traffic with all necessary installations. It is a turnkey contract with an estimated value of NOK 5.6bn ($564.5m). AF Gruppen, together with its consultant Norconsult, developed the project in collaboration with the Coastal Administration during the tender phase.
Construction will start in early 2027, with an estimated build period of about five years. The tunnel will be 1.7 km long, with a cross-section roughly 20 times that of a road tunnel.
It will allow both freight and passenger ships to transit directly between the Norwegian Sea to the north and the North Sea to the south while remaining within fjord waters, finally enabling year-round safe passage for ships shuttling between Bergen and Alesund. The 45 m high, 36 m wide tunnel will pass beneath a 645 m mountain and accommodate ships with a draft of 12 m.
"It is rare for us, as a design and build contractor, to have the opportunity to take on such a unique infrastructure project, attracting significant local, national, and international interest," said Amund Toftum, CEO of AF Gruppen.
The tunnel has been debated for more than a century, with its first mention in a newspaper article from 1874. More serious discussions began in 2013, when the concept moved into formal planning and was included in Norway's National Transport Plan. The country officially announced plans to build the Stad Ship Tunnel nearly a decade ago, in April 2017. Under that plan, construction was supposed to start in 2022 and finish in either 2025 or 2026, with the tunnel expected to cost around $319m. The go-ahead with state funding was given in March 2021.
