In the 10 years since the Panama Canal’s Third Set of Locks opened, the world has seen a major shift in how the canal supports global shipping. A set of canal locks is a series of connected lock chambers that raise and lower boats to navigate steep changes in water level.
As lead design engineer, Stantec helped the expansion create a new standard for marine infrastructure, transforming a system that was once too small to accommodate the modern vessels moving between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
The new locks are longer, wider, and deeper, allowing ships up to three times larger than before to pass through. Today, about 95 percent of the world’s container ships can use the canal—reshaping how goods move around the globe.
Beyond the scale, the design pushed boundaries in performance and sustainability. The system was built for a 100-year life span, with high reliability expectations and resilience to significant seismic forces. The design also introduced innovative water-saving basins that reuse up to 60 percent of water per transit.
A decade later, the Panama Canal’s Third Set of Locks is still a powerful example of what collaboration, sustainability, and engineering can achieve.
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