Power

Yesterday we check out the Battersea Power Station, which is open to the public for the "China Power" exhibition thru 5 Nov.

The BPS was completed in 1939 and the first in a series of very large coal-fired electrical generating facilities set up in England as part of the National Grid power distribution system. This sparked off protests from Londoners who felt the building was too large and and ugly, and from those who were worried about the pollution. When it first opened, the station had a 105 MW steam turbine, the largest in Europe, and expanded to 500 MW after WW II.

The turbines stopped turning in 1981 at around the time the BPS became a Grade 2 listed heritage site so saving it from the wrecking ball. In 1997, Parkside International purchased the BPS and its 38 acre lot to build a shopping mall and condo playground in around the building. So far, design delays and inadequate transportation links have prevented construction, but £1.1B has been ear-marked.

My photo BTW is taken from the southside of the BPS, facing North or towards the Thames and Pimlico on the other side of the river. To the left is the railway heading to Clapham Junction and outward South. Famously the BPS was photographed with a giant pig-shaped balloon floating gently above the smoke stacks for the cover of Pink Floyd's rock album "Animals".