Salini Impregilo and The Lane Construction Corporation attended on Thursday a ground-breaking ceremony in Fort Wayne in the U.S. state of Indiana to mark to the start of work on the $188-million Three Rivers Protection and Overflow Reduction Tunnel (3RPort), part of a project to reduce combined sewage overflow (CSO) into the city’s rivers.

The ceremony was held at the hub of the tunnel construction area near where the working shaft is to be dug. It is in this shaft that a tunnel boring machine (TBM) will be lowered and put into operation in 2018. The work is expected to be completed in 2021.

Salini Impregilo won the contract in April with joint-venture partner Lane’s S.A. Healy. Both S.A. Healy and Lane belong to the Salini Impregilo Group.

Once complete, the tunnel system will reduce 90% of CSO into the rivers, which occurs during big rain storms.

“We are very excited about this project,” said Giuseppe Quarta, Executive Vice President P3, Large Projects and Tunneling at Lane. “This is the fourth Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) we are building in the USA. Projects that improve quality of life, environmental projects, and renewable energy projects are part of the values and the main core business of our group of companies. We look forward to working with the local workforce and the local business community and authorities.”

Other CSO projects include the Dugway Storage Tunnel in Cleveland, Ohio, and the Anacostia River Tunnel in Washington, D.C.

The contract belongs to more than €2 billion worth of new orders that have been announced since the beginning of the year. Half of that amount comes from the United States, highlighting the country as Salini Impregilo’s single biggest market.