"Insane" EU energy and carbon policies lead to shutdown and deadly demolition of a perfectly working coal fired power plant. Nobody knows what caused the collapse of the massive boiler building
February 23, 2016 Didcot UK Power Station Collapse 1 killed 3 missing 5 injured. The decommissioned Didcot A Power Station in Oxfordshire, England closed in 2013 and was being prepared for demolition in ten days when half of the long 70m 15-20 storey high boiler house unexpectedly collapsed in a cloud of dust in what initially what thought to be an explosion. One person was killed, and three people were missing and believed likely to have died. Four or five people were injured, three seriously. Additionally, around 50 people have been treated for dust inhalation. Initial reports of an explosion were ruled out by police. While the exact cause is unknown and under investigation, the the partial collapse thought to have been caused by work to to prepare two boilers for demolition. The boiler house was a steel framed building which had the boilers suspended from the superstructure and above ground level, to allow for their expansion.
Coal dust theory speculation: maxspeed There is a lot of speculation on this story in the comments, you cannot rule out an explosion due to coal dust, when it's whipped into the general body of the air it is very volatile and none more so if they were using oxy acetylene cutters. It was a very real danger in coal mines, to the extent that special stone dust barriers were installed as a means to suppress any ignition of this type spreading throughout the mine, an ignition of this type feeds itself.
Nigel Brady*Wikipedia
Didcot power stations From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Didcot Power Stations
Didcot Power Station
Viewed from the south in September 2006
Didcot Power Stations refers to an active natural-gas power plant (Didcot B Power Station) that supplies the National Grid, and a closed[1] combined coal and oilpower plant (Didcot A Power Station). They are situated immediately adjoining one another in the civil parish of Sutton Courtenay, next to the town of Didcot inOxfordshire (formerly in Berkshire), in the UK. The combined power stations feature a chimney which is one of the tallest structures in the UK, and three hyperboliccooling towers (three others were demolished in 2014), which can be seen from much of the surrounding landscape.
Didcot A[edit]
History[edit]
Didcot A Power Station was a coal and gas-fired power station, which ceased operation on 22 March 2013. Designed by architect Frederick Gibberd, a vote was held in Didcot and surrounding villages on whether the power station should be built. There was strong opposition from Sutton Courtenay but the yes vote was carried, due to the number of jobs that would be created in the area. Construction of the 2,000 MWe power station for the Central Electricity Generating Board CEGB began during 1964, and was completed in 1968 at a cost of £104m, with up to 2,400 workers being employed at peak times. It is located on a 300 acres (1.2 km2) site formerly part of the Ministry of Defence Central Ordnance Depot. The main chimney is 650 ft (200 m) tall[2] with the six cooling towers 375 ft (114 m)[3] each.
English Heritage declined to give listed building status to Didcot A Power Station in 2013. Though it recognised there were some interesting features, for example the "carefully designed" setting and Gibberd's detailing, there were better examples elsewhere.[4]
Operation[edit]
The station used four 500 MWe generating units. In 2003 Didcot A burnt 3.7Mt of coal. The station burned mostly pulverised coal, but also co-fired with natural gas. Didcot was the first large power station to be converted to have this function. In addition, a small amount of biomass, such as sawdust, was burnt at the plant. This was introduced to try to depend more on renewable sources following the introduction of the Kyoto Protocol and, in April 2002, the Renewables Obligation. It was hoped that biomass could replace 2% of coal burnt. In 1996 and 1997, Thales UK was awarded contracts by Innogy (now npower) to implement the APMS supervisory and control system on all of the four units, then enabling optimised emissions monitoring and reporting.[5] Between 2005 and 2007 Didcot installed overfire air systems on the four boilers to reduce emissions of nitrous oxide.This ensured compliance with the Large Combustion Plant Directive.
Some ash from Didcot A was used to manufacture building blocks at a factory on the adjacent Milton Park and transported to Thatcham (near Newbury, Berkshire) for the manufacture of Thermalite aerated breeze blocks using both decarbonized fly and raw ash, but most was mixed with water and pumped via a pipeline to former quarries in Radley.
Environmental protests[edit]
2006 Greenpeace Protest
On the morning of Thursday 2 November 2006, 30 Greenpeace trespassers invaded the power station. One group chained themselves to a broken coal-carrying conveyor belt. A second group scaled the 650 ft high chimney, and set up a 'climate camp'. They proceeded to paint "Blair's Legacy" on the side of the chimney overlooking the town. Greenpeace asserted that Didcot Power Station was the second most polluting in Britain after Drax in North Yorkshire,[6] whilst Friends of the Earth describe it as the ninth worst in the UK.[7]
A similar protest occurred early on 26 October 2009, when nine climate change protesters climbed the chimney,[2] and eleven chained themselves to the coal delivery conveyors; the latter group were cut free by police after five hours, but the former waited until 28 October before coming down again — all twenty were arrested, and power supplies continued uninterrupted. The power station was installing improved security fencing at the time.[8]
2013 closure[edit]
Didcot A opted out of the Large Combustion Plant Directive which meant it was only be allowed to run for up to 20,000 hours after 1 January 2008 and must close by 31 December 2015 at the latest. The decision was made not to install Flue Gas Desulphurisation equipment which would have allowed continued generation. (not global warming)
Studies did continue into whether there was a possibility that Didcot A might be modernised with new super-clean coal burning capabilities; with RWE partly involved in the study,[9]however in September 2012 RWE Npower announced that Didcot A using its current coal burning capabilities would close at the end of March 2013.[1] On 22 March 2013, Didcot A closed and the de-commissioning process began.
Demolition[edit]
The three southern cooling towers of Didcot A were demolished by explosives on Sunday 27 July 2014 at 05:01 BST. The contractors had insisted that the demolition would take place between 3 am and 5 am; the towers were demolished at 5.01am.[10][11]
There had been a campaign to move the time of the demolition to 6 a.m. or later to enable local people to watch the demolition,[12] but RWE refused. Despite the early morning demolition, many thousands of people turned out locally to watch from numerous vantage points, as well as those who watched the towers come down via a live internet stream and the event trended heavily on Twitter with the hashtag #DidcotDemolition.[13]
2016 collapse[edit]
On 23 February 2016, a large section of the former boiler house at Didcot A power station collapsed while the building was being prepared for demolition.[14][15] One person was killed, and three people who remain missing as of the following afternoon are believed likely to have died.[16] Four or five people were injured,[14][15] three seriously.[16] Additionally, around 50 people have been treated for dust inhalation.[14] The rubble from the collapse is 9 metres high and unstable, which along with the instability of the remaining half of the building is hampering search efforts.[16]
The collapse occurred at around 16:00 GMT, and Thames Valley Police declared a "major incident" shortly thereafter. Initial reports of an explosion were ruled out by police after being reported in the media for several hours following the incident.[14][15]
The boiler house was a steel framed building which had the boilers suspended from the superstructure and above ground level, to allow for their expansion.[4]
*Sources Dated
THURSDAY, 17 JULY 2014 Blowing Up Didcot Power Station.
http://thefrogsalittlehot.blogspot.com/2014/07/blowing-up-didcot-power-station.html
Time is soon to be called on the structures of Didcot A power station which, despite being in working order when it was closed last year and being an iconic landmark in Oxfordshire, was thrown onto the scrap heap over a year ago due to EU laws regarding coal-fired power stations.As a consequence Didcot A power station and three of the six iconic cooling towers which have dominated the skyline for 40 years will now only dominate for just over a week as the countdown marches on relentlessly towards their demolition.
Peter Hitchens in the Daily Mail puts forward a slightly cynical motive for the timing:
I wonder why the electricity company npower wants to demolish the mighty cooling towers of Didcot ‘A’ power station in the middle of the night, between 3am and 5am on Sunday, July 27.
Didcot ‘A’ has been shut to satisfy EU rules against coal-fired power stations, themselves driven by unproven fantasies about man-made global warming. Even if this were true, it would be futile. As Didcot falls, China will no doubt be opening two or three coal-powered stations.
The company says the pre-dawn demolition is to ensure ‘safety’ and ‘minimal disruption’. But could they be influenced by the fact that film of the levelling of a perfectly viable power station might become a lasting symbol of our insane energy policies – the deliberate, dogma-driven destruction of scarce generating capacity just as we face a severe risk of power cuts?
Hitchens clearly implies that the early morning timing is a policy by RWE NPower to try to reduce the symbolism of EU-inspired insane energy policies.
*Sources
Feb 23, 2016
One dead and three missing after Didcot power...
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/live/2016/feb/23/explosion-at-didcot-power-station-reported-live-updates Aerial footage shows damage to Didcot power station after collapse – video ... Oxfordshire fire and rescue service have confirmed that one person has ... are to launch an investigation into why the building collapsed earlier ... “At this time thecause is unknown and the search is continuing for ..... UK News.
Didcot Power Station collapse: One dead and three...
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-35641766
Before and after photo of Didcot power station collapse ... A Health and Safety Executive investigation has also been ... A senior spokesman for Npower said that it was a partial collapse, not an explosion, that caused a section of the ...
Didcot Power Station collapse: One dead and three...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-35641766
A senior spokesman for Npower said that it was a partial collapse, not an explosion, that caused a section of the ...
Didcot Power Station Collapse: What We Know So...
http://www.gizmodo.co.uk/2016/02/didcot-power-station-collapse-what-we-know-so-far/
A major emergency services incident is still underway today after anexplosion was reported at Didcot A Power Station in Oxfordshire.
Didcot power station: Four feared dead and five...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/12170717/Didcot-power-station-building-collapse-live-updates.html
Didcot A power stationwas due to be demolished by end of year ... It is thought to have been caused by work to to prepare two boilers for demolition. ... The collapse comes just over a year after a major fire struck a cooling tower at the Didcot B power station in ...
explosion - From Oxford Mail
http://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/14296463.Explosion_at_Didcot_Power_Station/
All the latest updates from 'major incident' at Didcot Power station as ... an investigationwith Thames Valley Police into why the building collapsed earlier than planned. - At this time the cause is unknown
Didcot power station ‘explosion’ declared with casualties after demolition goes wrongDaily Mail
February 23, 2016 ‘There is a coal power station there and there is a gas-fired power station there, and the coal power station has been decommissioned. ‘There are six cooling towers, they are the symbol of Didcot, and three of those towers were brought down in a properly-controlled explosion a year ago and the next three are due to be brought down soon.
One person reported dead after collapse at British power stationFox News February 23, 2016
‘Massive’ explosion reported at defunct UK power stationTheJournal.ie via Yahoo UK & Ireland News February 23, 2016
Didcot Power Station collapse: One dead and three missing ...
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-35641766
One person has died and three people are missing following the collapse of a building at Didcot A Power Station. A major incident was declared at the site ...
Didcot power station: Four feared dead and five injured after ...
www.telegraph.co.uk/.../Didcot-power-station...updates.html
Four people are feared dead after a building collapse at Didcot Power Station. Emergency services declared a “major incident” with one person dead ...
Didcot power station ‘explosion’ declared with casualties ...
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3460594/Emergency...
Witnesses said Didcot Power Station in Oxfordshire was felt 'shuddering' after the blast at about 4pm, while others described it collapsing ‘in a huge pile of dust’.
' Explosion' at Didcot power station - ITV News
www.itv.com/.../2016-02-23/explosion-at-didcot-power-station
Feb 22, 2016 · Police say they are dealing with an "incident" at Didcot Power Stationamid reports of an explosion at the site. Follow ITV News for the latest.
Didcot power station 'explosion': At least one feared dead ...
www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/didcot-power...
At least one person is feared dead following reports of a "massive explosion" at DidcotPower Station in Oxfordshire. A major incident has been declared and emergency ...
Didcot power station explosion: 'One person killed after ...
www.mirror.co.uk/news/.../didcot-power-station-explosion...
A "major incident" has been declared and one person is believed to have been killed after reports of an explosion at Didcot Power Station. Emergency services were ...
Explosion hits Didcot power station RESCUERS say it is "highly unlikely" three people missing in the rubble of Didcot powerstation will be found alive – as pictures emerge of the first victim.
Didcot power station: one dead and three missing after after ...
www.theguardian.com/uk-news/live/2016/feb/23/explosion...
Emergency services say five others have been taken to hospital after a building collapsed at Didcot power station in Oxfordshire
Didcot Power Station 'Collapse' Leaves One Dead And Three ...
www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2016/02/23/didcot-power-station...
One person has died, three are missing and five are in hospital after a building "collapse" at Didcot power station in Oxfordshire on Tuesday.
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