Totally OT: Power Plant tour

[ultrarunner]

Had the chance to tour a small 50MW steam turbine power plant that used extra steam from a paper mill operation...

It was really interesting and did supply PGE.

All gone now when the mill shut down... I think it was sold and went overseas... mill and power plant.

 

[greif]

Got to tour a nuc plant about 25 years ago while it was down for refurbishment and refueling. Pretty cool except the 50's style controls were Scarry, would have liked to see more modern but now thanking about these controls can' t be hacked... too old

Would not be able to get past a nuc plant gate now days

 

[MossRoad]

Had the chance to tour a small 50MW steam turbine power plant that used extra steam from a paper mill operation...

It was really interesting and did supply PGE.

All gone now when the mill shut down... I think it was sold and went overseas... mill and power plant.

I got a tour of Notre Dame's power plant a few years ago. They had 4 coal boilers, two natural gas boilers, and two surplus WWII submarine diesel/electric generators given to them by the Navy after WWII. Got to go through the coal bunker and overhead feeding system. Kinda scary up there. One coal boiler was always down for preventative maintenance. Neat setup. Anyhow, they are just now in the process of converting all to natural gas.

 

[chim]

Toured three plants near here over a period of many years. Nuke, coal and hydro are all within 45 mintes or so. The nuke plant is TMI and the first tour was while it was under construction. After it was in operation I went through twice before the 1979 "unpleasantness" and once after. Security changed drastically over the years. Last time was before 9/11 and even then things were really tight. They had what looked like walk-through metal detectors that sniffed for explosives.

Security at the coal plant wasn't nearly as tight, but there was protocol. The hydro plant was almost a mom & pop operation compared with the others. Everyone was really laid back. The equipment on each was very impressive. The guide at the hydro plant took great pleasure in telling us that "the water comes in there, spins these and goes out there". The carbon footprint was pretty much limited to an employee taking a smoke break.

 

[jack707]

I have a funny story on time I was working the cops brought their dogs well every elevation is grating so when the elevator open the cops and the drug dogs got out when the dog stepped out and look down it went back into the elevator and would not come back out!!.

 

[Rock knocker]

Had the chance to tour a small 50MW steam turbine power plant that used extra steam from a paper mill operation...

It was really interesting and did supply PGE.

All gone now when the mill shut down... I think it was sold and went overseas... mill and power plant.

Which plant was that? We probably worked on it years ago.

 

[fordmantpw]

Probably would be different if this was a nuclear plant.

Yes, yes it would have been.

Thanks for sharing! I've toured the nuke plant near me (actually worked there as a consultant for 7 years) and the size of the equipment is amazing!

 

[buickanddeere]

Fires occur in the ball mills on occasion , in particular with soft volatile coal such as Powder River Basin .

 

[buickanddeere]

The updated security after 911 helped employee a lot of folks who otherwise could not hold an ordinary civilian job.

 

[jack707]

To get a red bage to work in a nuke today is about 1" thick with papers to fill out, then if you pass that it's the psy.test. you pass that you good to work Cost to Cost but I don't think it worth all the BS