Niagara Falls, ON: 1905-1999 Ontario Power Generating Station

(Satellite)

Boat View, Sep 2013

I'm guessing that the generator is on the left and that it is powered by two motors. Or is it one motor driving two generators?

Talita stole content
Thanks for accepting me to this site. I worked for Ontario Hydro until I retired and seeing antique electrical gear was an every day occurrence for me. The photo is an Ontario Power GS unit. The plant, now mothballed is at the base of Niagara falls. It was put into service in 1905 and produced 25 cycle power (which was the norm in Ontario until about 1960) to the end, supplying large indutsries in the Niagara peninsular. ( I took the picture in 1987)

Luther Jones: I know 25 cycle power is still produced in the United States for railroads, but I didn’t know it was used in Canada for regular power use up to 1960. 😊

Cory Hathaway: Luther Jones 2006 was the end of 25 cycle in Canada.

Curtis Noble: Washington Mills in Niagara Falls still use 25HZ power.

Christopher Camalick: At Inland Steel in Indiana it started, grew and continued with 25 cycle and later (1950) added 2 huge Sherbius units to convert 60 to 25 back and forth. Later (1960) a "static" one was purchased that never performed adequately. All 25 was eliminated just few years ago. One great thing about the 25 cycle was long distances had less voltage drop compared to the 60. DC was even better but the limitations of 750V made it impractical for any distances over 1,000 feet.

[Several comments note were 25hz power was used recently.]

"The 15 generators produced 203,000 horsepower (132,500 kilowatts) of 25 cycle electric power. This plant has twice been flooded by ice and water in 1909 and 1938. Each time this happened the plant was put out of service for many months." [NiagaraFallsInfo]

Tom Bourgeois posted 11 photos with the comment: 

Decommissioned Ontario Power Generating Station.

Niagara Falls, ON

Norm Crawford: We worked on decommissioning this Ontario Power plant at the base of the falls and the Toronto Plant at the top of the falls for over a year! Great bit of history! All of the tons of solid copper buzz bars were like gold! I was told that the first $2,600,000 of all of the scrap went back to the hydro! Then all of the remaining scrap was to go to pay for the cost of all of the work being done to decommission the plant! And that was probably much more than that! Another tid bit of facts is that after we removed all of the equipment we reinforce both buildings roof trusses in case the building had a future use! All unsafe items like Asbestos, Mercury, Lead, and yes even PCBs were removed also!

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Andy Clark commented on Norm's comment

What's left in there now, Norm?

I got sort of tour in there with a hydro employee friend about '99.

Alan Buchner: Andy Clark Tesla generators , all gone

This must be one of those ice floods that took it offline.

Alan Buchner commented on Tom's post
OPC operations

Alan Buchner commented on Tom's post, cropped
Gate house water intake building, pipes run underground from here to station.
[If you find the location of this building, please leave a comment.]

Norm Crawford commented on Andy's comment
This is what the Ontario hydro looks like now! All gone!

Norm Crawford commented on his comment
This was before we started.

Some other photos that Norm Crawford provided in some comments on his comment.

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