Plessa power plant

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Plessa power plant
The Plessa adventure power plant
The Plessa adventure power plant
location
Plessa power plant (Brandenburg)
Plessa power plant
Coordinates 51 ° 28 '16 "  N , 13 ° 36' 40"  E Coordinates: 51 ° 28 '16 "  N , 13 ° 36' 40"  E
country Germany
Data
Type Steam power plant
Primary energy Fossil energy
fuel Brown coal
power 54 megawatts (in 1945)
owner * Gröba Electricity Association (1927 to?)
  • Black Pump Gas Combination (? Until around 1989/90)
  • Municipality of Plessa , Hanseatic Corporation (around 1989/90 to 1995)
  • Plessa municipality (1995 to around 2001)
  • Industrial monument and industrial museum Kraftwerk Plessa gGmbH (since around 2001)
Project start 1926
Start of operations 1927
Shutdown 1992
turbine 4 steam turbines
boiler 5 steam boilers
Chimney height Chimney 1: 115.2 m
Chimney 2: 120 m
Website www.kraftwerk-plessa.de
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The Plessa power plant is an industrial monument in the southern Brandenburg municipality of Plessa in the Elbe-Elster district and one of the oldest lignite power plants in Europe , which has been preserved in its original structure. The power plant was put into operation in 1927 by the Gröba Electricity Association . In the 1920s and 1930s it was one of the most modern peak load power plants of the time. After the end of the three main construction phases in 1942, the power plant had an output of 54 MW, which sank to 34 MW after the reparations payments in 1945 . In April 1992 the power plant was shut down and taken off the grid. As an adventure power plant , it was included in the project list of the International Building Exhibition Fürst-Pückler-Land in 1998 under the motto Power Plant in Transition and its demolition was prevented.

history

Planning, construction and commissioning

The administration building

After the need for electrical power increased due to the growing industrialization of the region after the First World War , the Gröba Electricity Association, founded in 1910, decided to build a necessary peak load power plant, because until then only a diesel power plant with 4000  kilowatts of power was used to cover peaks or incidents Was available. The company was based in the Riesa suburb of Gröba and previously obtained the electrical energy mainly as external electricity.

Due to the favorable production conditions due to the nearby and then modern, efficient lignite mine Agnes , where the first overburden conveyor bridge in the world was put into operation in 1924 , as well as the briquette factory of Plessaer Braunkohlenkraftwerke GmbH located here , the decision was made to locate it in Plessa. In addition, the location had rail connections to the Kohlfurt – Falkenberg / Elster railway line and to the works railway of the brown coal mine company. A long-term supply contract for the delivery of raw lignite was concluded with the lignite mines. In return, they obtained electricity from the power plant.

In May 1926, Berlin-based Siemens-Schuckertwerke GmbH received the order as general contractor to design and build the plant. The plant was planned from the outset as a modular power plant and should be expandable in order to ensure that electricity could be supplied after a short time. Its output should initially be 8000 kW.

After a construction period of almost a year, the power plant finally went into operation in April 1927 on the route of Europe's first 110 kV line .

Expansion stages of the power plant

The construction of the power plant took place in three main construction phases from 1926 to 1942.

In the course of the first expansion phase of the power plant from 1926 to 1928, the first power plant section was built with the administration section, the electrical switchgear and a 115.2 m high chimney. Turbine 1, which was first put into operation in 1927, had an output of 8,000 kW. Boilers 1 to 3 and cooling tower I were also built during this period. Turbine 2 with 10,000 kW and cooling tower II followed in 1928.

In the years 1929 and 1930, the machine and boiler house, the external bunker and other ancillary facilities were expanded during the second expansion phase. In 1930 turbine 3 with an output of 16,000 kW and boiler 4 went into operation.

During the third expansion phase from 1936 to 1942, the machine house and the boiler house were extended and closed, and the extension for water treatment was built. During this time, additional ancillary systems were built and the second 120 m high chimney was built in 1940 and 1941, which served to evacuate the smoke from boilers 4 and 5. In 1942 a fourth turbine with an output of 20,000 kW was put into operation, but after the Second World War in 1945 it went to the Soviet Union as a reparation payment .

After the Second World War, various maintenance and modernization conversions were carried out to preserve the substance, such as the renewal of the machine house ceiling in 1950, the erection of cooling tower IV in 1954 and the installation of larger transformers during the conversion from 60  kV to 110 kV in 1973. From 1976 to 1978 the Change of coal transport via an inclined conveyor belt.

Shutdown

As early as July 22, 1985, the entire complex was placed under monument protection. At the time of the political turnaround , the power plant belonged to the Schwarze Pump gas combine . After it was dissolved by the Berlin Treuhandanstalt , the community of Plessa and the Hanseatic Corporation took it over to continue producing electricity. According to the new usage concept, the energy source should be natural gas, which would have required high investments and major renovations. The project failed and could not be implemented. On April 14, 1992, the last turbine generator was shut down and the power plant was taken off the grid.

On January 1, 1996, the municipality of Plessa became the sole owner of the power plant.

Technical data (extract)

View from the east
  • 1 nacelle:
The 96 m long steel framework, lined with clinker bricks, was used to accommodate the turbines and the coupled generators required to generate electricity.
turbine power
Turbine 1 0megawatts
Turbine 2 10 MW
Turbine 3 16 MW
Turbine 4 20 MW (dismantled in 1945)
Total: 54 MW (1942-1945)
  • 1 boiler house:
The 84 m long steel frame construction, lined with clinker bricks, was used to accommodate five boilers to generate superheated steam . Above the boiler house is the high bunker, a coal storage that was fed with the help of the conveyor (conveyor belt), a bucket conveyor built in 1926 that was able to transport 60 t of raw lignite crushed in the crusher tunnel from the outer bunker to the bunker in one hour  . Two conveyor belts ran parallel to the bunker . These were used to distribute the coal to the 2,000 t bunker pockets.
  • 1 outside bunker:
The 35 m long outer bunker was built in 1926 on a single track in reinforced concrete. Its raw lignite capacity was 235 t. In 1928 it was extended in a northerly direction with two tracks to a length of 104 m and a capacity of 1200 t.
  • 4 cooling towers:
The four cooling towers were used to cool the condenser cooling water , which in turn condensed the expanded steam emerging from the turbines into water in the condensers. The cooling towers 3 and 4 erected in 1938 and 1954 were dismantled in the course of the renovation.
The water supply for the required cooling water was provided by deep wells . Water was drawn from the Schwarzen Elster , approx. 2 km away , via a double line for the supply of additional water and for the rest of the main water supply. For this purpose, a pump house was built on the river with an hourly flow rate of 75 cubic meters.
The water treatment facility housed two approximately 11 m high water tanks. The boiler feed water and cooling water were taken from here.
  • Chimney 1: 115.2 m high
  • Chimney 2: 120 m high
  • Size of the total area: 6 ha
There are other buildings on the site, such as the switch house, the administration building, the electrical workshop and, in addition to other auxiliary buildings, the social wing, which housed the canteen , as well as changing rooms and washing facilities.
The gatehouse, built in 1940, is currently (2008) used as an entrance and information point for visitors.

IBA project Plessa adventure power plant

The bar in the Plessa power plant during a techno event

At an advisory board meeting in 1998, the power plant was included in the project list of the international building exhibition Fürst-Pückler-Land as an adventure power plant under the motto Power Plant in Transition . A year later, the project idea of ​​a commercial-museum reuse was presented. In 2001 the support association Kraftwerk Plessa e. V. and the municipality of Plessa founded the industrial monument and industrial museum Kraftwerk Plessa gGmbH , which is currently (2008) the owner of the six hectare complex. In September of the same year, renovation and securing work began on the property, with the roof renovation first being the focus.

The power plant is part of the KANN network (“Culture and Work in New Lower Lusatia”). The extraction, processing and conversion of lignite from the Lauchhammer mining region can be documented at original locations in the context of the various projects, such as the F60 conveyor bridge in Lichterfeld that has been prepared for inspection and the Louise briquette factory in Domsdorf .

The future concept includes the continuation of the expansion and renovation with a museum character. The redesigned machine hall will house a versatile event hall, and a culture brewery with an adjoining culture brewery will complement the project. In addition, rooms are to be created for permanent and temporary exhibitions; A fruit refinement should process the fruits of the orchards surrounding the place .

Fixed and regular events

Every year on May 1st there is a power plant festival in the power plant. Furthermore, various exhibitions and events take place during the year.

Tourist connection

The federal highway 169 runs through Plessa and leads east to Schwarzheide and the BAB 13 . Several cycle paths connect the power plant with the sights in the surrounding area, the Niederlausitzer Heidelandschaft nature park and the neighboring Schradenland . With the Brandenburg Tour , which opened in 2007, Germany's longest long-distance cycle path, at 1,111 kilometers, also runs through Plessa. Further cycle routes are the Fürst-Pückler-Weg , the 108 km long Schwarze-Elster-Radweg and the route "Coal-Wind & Water", opened in 2007, a 250 km long energy historical foray with fourteen stations through the Elbe-Elster-Land.

literature

  • Andreas Pöschl (Red.): Coal, wind and water. An energy historical foray through the Elbe-Elsterland . Cultural Office of the Elbe-Elster District, Herzberg / Elster 2001, ISBN 3-00-008956-X .
  • Katja Wolf (Red.): IBA mid-term documentation 2000–2010. The International Building Exhibition (IBA) Fürst-Pückler-Land in Lausitz . International Building Exhibition (IBA) Fürst-Pückler-Land, Großräschen 2005 (= Bewegtes Land), ISBN 3-9809844-1-9 . (Text in German, English, Polish)
  • Iris Berndt (Red.): Cycle tour coal-wind & water. A foray into the history of energy . Elbe-Elster district, Herzberg / Elster 2007
  • Plessa adventure power plant . Industrial monument and industrial museum Kraftwerk Plessa gGmbH, Plessa o. J.

Web links

Commons : Erlebnis-Kraftwerk Plessa  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Sources, individual references

  • The main sources used were the book Coal, Wind and Water published by the Elbe-Elster District Cultural Office . An energy-historical foray through the Elbe-Elsterland , as well as the homepage of the Plessa power plant.
  1. List of monuments of the state of Brandenburg: Elbe-Elster district (PDF) Brandenburg State Office for Monument Preservation and State Archaeological Museum
  2. reiseland-brandenburg.de ( Memento of the original from April 19, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.reiseland-brandenburg.de
  3. The Black Elster Cycle Path on magicmaps