Eggborough Power Station - October 2019
Introduction
Being that this report is nearly two years old it is probably best to post it by now, even if it is well documented already, so here goes.
Visited with
@ xplorer.x
@ UrbandonedTeam
@ DustySensorPhotography
The visit.
We had been talking a lot about visiting a power station and doing an overnight, ish, explore. It was something that had yet to happen.
Eventually, having recently began driving, we decided to crack on with conducting our visit.
Having left we collected our first member en-rote and continued north to Leeds through the heavy rain. Arriving we waited a few additional hours more than expected in the Station awaiting the arrival of the Urbandoned. Eventually, after a KFC, they appeared and we piled into the car. The original plan, for some reason, was to camp nearby but with the constant rain we decided to drive straight to the station and get in.
Having driven into Ferrybridge services we decided otherwise, yet again, and tried to sleep in the car until the early hours.
We woke up at around 3am, cleared our eyes, and piled in and out of the car to begin our arrival at the power station. After a couple minuets of monster fueled driving we parked up, again reorganized, and began our walk. The rain piled on as we cautiously walked down the road, on the lookout for anyone potentially from the security teams, and started to loose sight of the aircraft warning beacons as the trees neared. Behind a small substation we entered the grasslands surrounding the fence, further soaking ourselves, and began to approach.
Once in the cover of the shafts we walked up and came to the mass of razor wire trampled down by previous visitors. Past that and untangled we headed to the top and slept until around sunrise.
Getting in was memorable enough.
Phone Imagery Because Cold and Wet.
History
Proposals for the power station began at the time of the Ferrybridge C power station construction in early 1961. The power-station's construction began a year later in 1962 with Sherwood hall being demolished to accommodate the station.
Sherwood Hall dated back to around 1605 was owned by a succession of family members until the 1800's when bought by a farmer. The hall was surrounded by the Hamlet of Sherwood hall lasted noted in 1952 on maps, presumably wiped out by what became Eggborough power station and the sprawl of Eggborough itself in later years.
The station would be completed in 1967, a year after Ferrybridge, and began generating power. Although it was not officially opened until 1970.
The station's external architecture contrasted against the warm, dark, coloration of the cooling towers and chimney with cool and modern expressions achieved using vast amounts of aluminium.
The station was built and operated under the Central Electricity Generating Board (CEGB), operated by the board until its privatization. In 1990 it was taken over by National Power, who were one of the three generating companies, set up after the privatisation.
Like most others it was then passed between several owners.
In 2000 the plant was sold onto British Energy, previously Nuclear Electric and Later EDF, who operated the plant alongside their nuclear plants primarily to provide stability to their generating capacity and avoid charges set out by the new agreements coming into force in 2001. At the time of British Energy's purchase the demand for power stations was high but in the coming years, 2002, the price of the plant was half what they paid.
British Energy was taken over by EDF in 2009 and became the operators of the plant. It was realised that the bondholders of the plant could purchase the plant and did so with the take over completed by April 2010. The company in charge became known as Eggborough Power Limited.
Eggborough Power Limited, along with the plant, would later be taken over by a Czech holdings firm Energeticky a Prumyslovy in 2015.
The Images.
We were now in the boiler house. Very little time was spent here as the turbines were placed at the top of the list to see.
Starting off in the coal drops.
The four boilers were constructed by the Foster Wheeler Corporation, who were specialists in steam boilers, and John Brown and Co, who were a specialist engineering firm, in collaboration. Specifications of the boilers meant at reheat the boilers had a capacity of 550Kg/s producing steam at a pressure of 158 Bar super-heated to 568 Degrees C.
As said we, regrettably, spent little time in the boiler house.
The Turbine Halls
Once off the boiler house we got our first overview of the turbine hall.
In here, or the Boiler house, somewhere there's the trio of Auxiliary 17.5MW RR Olympus gas turbines used for powering the station from a Black start which were dismantled long before closure of the plant.
The main turbines were four sets of Associated Electrical Industries (AEI), Later GEC, turbo generators capable of producing 500MegaWatts Each. Unit one was the first connected after completion of the plant in 1967 with units two to four being connected as time when on.
Once we had spent more time than necessary in the turbine hall so we attempted to tackle the Control Room.
Walking up to the doors we went through and then realised the main control room was locked. Leaving the others behind two of us went ahead underneath and found a way inside.
Inside the control room is a spacious and bright room even with the long cut power off. Like most the room is organised with unit controls within each corner and engineering stations dotted between.
View attachment 916153
By now the morning was pushing on and after quite a few hours inside we decided to leave as we knew that the whole entry would have to be done again in reverse.
The power station was threatened and spared the fate of closure a few times.
First plans were announced in 2015 to close the plant in 2016, however, it was spared for an additional year.
It was in August 2016 the plant was announced to run commercially up until September 2016 with Units one and two providing back up to the national grid.
When september rolled around Unit four emerged from Maintenance with the capability to provide commercially to the national grid. During this time, August 2016, initial plans were unveiled for the demolition of the plant to be replaced by a Gas Turbine station capable of 2,00MW with completion of the plans estimated for 2022.
The plant continued on until 2018 when its plans to close were finalized in February. The station was declared unavailable on the 23rd of March 2018.
We had been talking a lot about visiting a power station and doing an overnight, ish, explore. It was something that had yet to happen.
Eventually, having recently began driving, we decided to crack on with conducting our visit.
Having left we collected our first member en-rote and continued north to Leeds through the heavy rain. Arriving we waited a few additional hours more than expected in the Station awaiting the arrival of the Urbandoned. Eventually, after a KFC, they appeared and we piled into the car. The original plan, for some reason, was to camp nearby but with the constant rain we decided to drive straight to the station and get in.
Having driven into Ferrybridge services we decided otherwise, yet again, and tried to sleep in the car until the early hours.
We woke up at around 3am, cleared our eyes, and piled in and out of the car to begin our arrival at the power station. After a couple minuets of monster fueled driving we parked up, again reorganized, and began our walk. The rain piled on as we cautiously walked down the road, on the lookout for anyone potentially from the security teams, and started to loose sight of the aircraft warning beacons as the trees neared. Behind a small substation we entered the grasslands surrounding the fence, further soaking ourselves, and began to approach.
Once in the cover of the shafts we walked up and came to the mass of razor wire trampled down by previous visitors. Past that and untangled we headed to the top and slept until around sunrise.
Getting in was memorable enough.
Phone Imagery Because Cold and Wet.
History
Proposals for the power station began at the time of the Ferrybridge C power station construction in early 1961. The power-station's construction began a year later in 1962 with Sherwood hall being demolished to accommodate the station.
Sherwood Hall dated back to around 1605 was owned by a succession of family members until the 1800's when bought by a farmer. The hall was surrounded by the Hamlet of Sherwood hall lasted noted in 1952 on maps, presumably wiped out by what became Eggborough power station and the sprawl of Eggborough itself in later years.
The station would be completed in 1967, a year after Ferrybridge, and began generating power. Although it was not officially opened until 1970.
The station's external architecture contrasted against the warm, dark, coloration of the cooling towers and chimney with cool and modern expressions achieved using vast amounts of aluminium.
The station was built and operated under the Central Electricity Generating Board (CEGB), operated by the board until its privatization. In 1990 it was taken over by National Power, who were one of the three generating companies, set up after the privatisation.
Like most others it was then passed between several owners.
In 2000 the plant was sold onto British Energy, previously Nuclear Electric and Later EDF, who operated the plant alongside their nuclear plants primarily to provide stability to their generating capacity and avoid charges set out by the new agreements coming into force in 2001. At the time of British Energy's purchase the demand for power stations was high but in the coming years, 2002, the price of the plant was half what they paid.
British Energy was taken over by EDF in 2009 and became the operators of the plant. It was realised that the bondholders of the plant could purchase the plant and did so with the take over completed by April 2010. The company in charge became known as Eggborough Power Limited.
Eggborough Power Limited, along with the plant, would later be taken over by a Czech holdings firm Energeticky a Prumyslovy in 2015.
The Images.
We were now in the boiler house. Very little time was spent here as the turbines were placed at the top of the list to see.
Starting off in the coal drops.
The four boilers were constructed by the Foster Wheeler Corporation, who were specialists in steam boilers, and John Brown and Co, who were a specialist engineering firm, in collaboration. Specifications of the boilers meant at reheat the boilers had a capacity of 550Kg/s producing steam at a pressure of 158 Bar super-heated to 568 Degrees C.
As said we, regrettably, spent little time in the boiler house.
The Turbine Halls
Once off the boiler house we got our first overview of the turbine hall.
In here, or the Boiler house, somewhere there's the trio of Auxiliary 17.5MW RR Olympus gas turbines used for powering the station from a Black start which were dismantled long before closure of the plant.
The main turbines were four sets of Associated Electrical Industries (AEI), Later GEC, turbo generators capable of producing 500MegaWatts Each. Unit one was the first connected after completion of the plant in 1967 with units two to four being connected as time when on.
Once we had spent more time than necessary in the turbine hall so we attempted to tackle the Control Room.
Walking up to the doors we went through and then realised the main control room was locked. Leaving the others behind two of us went ahead underneath and found a way inside.
Inside the control room is a spacious and bright room even with the long cut power off. Like most the room is organised with unit controls within each corner and engineering stations dotted between.
View attachment 916153
By now the morning was pushing on and after quite a few hours inside we decided to leave as we knew that the whole entry would have to be done again in reverse.
The power station was threatened and spared the fate of closure a few times.
First plans were announced in 2015 to close the plant in 2016, however, it was spared for an additional year.
It was in August 2016 the plant was announced to run commercially up until September 2016 with Units one and two providing back up to the national grid.
When september rolled around Unit four emerged from Maintenance with the capability to provide commercially to the national grid. During this time, August 2016, initial plans were unveiled for the demolition of the plant to be replaced by a Gas Turbine station capable of 2,00MW with completion of the plans estimated for 2022.
The plant continued on until 2018 when its plans to close were finalized in February. The station was declared unavailable on the 23rd of March 2018.
