Towns and Nature: Avon Lake, OH: 1926+1970-2022 680 MW Avon Lake Power Plant

safe_image for Avon Lake power plant to close, city officials say
It currently operates less than 50 days per year with 50 employees. It should close in the Fall of 2021. The good news is that it opens up some prime lakeshore property.

The plant was built in 1926, but the 680 MW unit that is currently operating, Unit 9, was built in 1970. Unit 7 (86 MW) was built in 1949 and retired in 2016.The plant is operating with a "Mercury and Air Toxics (MATS) extension granted by the Ohio EPA." The property taxes were already reduced in 2017. [gem] Given the unit numbers, several smaller units were built and replaced over the life of the plant.

Jim Archbold posted
Avon Lake Plant, Avon Lake, Ohio
About a year ago... [or 2022]
Mike Brubaker: I remember when a transformer exploded. We heard and felt it 30 miles away
Don Nichols: Mike Brubaker It happened in 1997 if I'm correct.
Joe LaDuca: Mike Brubaker the transformer explosion at Turkey Point Nuclear was legendary. Brand new!

Adam O'Malley posted

A work-in-progress diagram of the now-defunct CEI plant in Avon Lake, Ohio, near my hometown.

This plant was originally operational in 1926, and new units, updates and additions were built onto it over the following decades. One of the things that always interested me about this plant was the different "eras" of architecture throughout the building, from the 1920's ornamental designs on the east side, to the industrial utilitarian look of Unit 9 and its precipitator on the west side.

Units 1 - 4: 1926 - 1981

Unit 5: 1943 - 1997

Unit 6: 1949 - 1997

Unit 7: 1949 - 2016

Unit 8: 1957 - 1987

Unit 9: 1970 - 2022

Units 6, 7 and 9 precipitators added in late 70s to early 80s

(Since this is a work in progress, any corrections are welcome. Some sources are conflicting.)

Joseph Hallstrom: Unit 8 was a C-E Sulzer Monotube unit (I can't find the performance data for the unit). A B&W precipitator was added to it in 1980. Unit 9 was a B&W Universal Pressure unit rated at 4628000 pounds per hour main steam, 3785 psi, and 1005F / 1005F.

ClevelandHistorical, one of eight images
On July 31, 1926, this rotor was installed into the final turbo generator of C.E.I.'s power station in Avon Lake.
Image courtesy of Cleveland State University. Michael Schwartz Library. Special Collections.

"When it opened [1926], the Avon Lake plant became the largest of its kind in the world, capable of producing a magnificent 400,000 horsepower." [ClevelandHistorical, Matt Sisson] (400k hp is 300kw. According to some photos, the old part had four smokestacks so that was built with 75mw units.)

In 1963 the bleeding edge transmission voltage was evidently 354k. [ClevelandHistorical-photo3] By 1965 the generating units were up to 250kw. [ClevelandHistorical-photo4]

Once again, a subject will be disappearing so I saved some satellite images.

It has a long, skinny coal storage pile.

3D Satellite

Don Nichols posted
A cross-section of the 1926 section of the Avon Lake power plant.

How much of this becomes condos vs. a public park remains to be seen. The city hopes that Federal money will help cleanup the brownland.

3D Satellite

In 1967 the red rectangle had four smokestacks. And the three smokestacks to the left of the red rectangle also existed. [ClevelandHistorical-photo7]

3D Satellite

Evan Manley posted
Avon Lake (Ohio)
Photo from May 2021. It’s my understanding this plant is unfortunately shut down as of recently.
Eric Sethman: In the news to be demolished by out of state contractor.
[Is there a shovel ready industry ready to make use of this land? If it is being torn down to create another weed field, that is going to look pretty bad when we start getting rolling blackouts.]

Ed Lowe posted seven images with the comment: "Avon Lake power station! Former CEI, First Energy, power station Now GenOn schedule to close doors on April 1, 2022."

Charles Comini: Maybe had the largest coal roll mills I ever worked on.

Gary Wetzler: identical to Cheswick, and yes, they were the largest made

Third photo posted by Carson King
Unit #2

Adam O'Malley posted
CEI Avon Lake - "Ash line break, May 25, 1976."
An interesting photo I found while browsing the CSU Cleveland Memory Project archive. I'm assuming the people sitting on the pier are plant workers waiting it out, since those piers are only accessible from within the plant.
Steve Stalter: They’re fishermen. In the past, people would go on the wall dividing the water intakes from the water discharge. I believe you could walk along Lake Erie’s shore to get to wall and the plant allowed it.
David Adkins: Steve Stalter They tried to stop them because of the liability issues with a fence, but they kept cutting it. The current coming from the plant had a hell of undertow. Several people fell in and got sucked under and drowned.

24 drone photos (source)

After nearly 100 years of operation, the former CEI Avon Lake Power Plant will go offline for good, on April 1st, 2022. The plant sits on 40 acres of lakefront property.

Keith Rearick: Hard to believe that PJM is allowing a lot of base load units are shutting down.

Jeffrey Hirleman: Cheswick yesterday and Avon today.

Tim Stehle: Richard Smith viability is a fleeting state. Follow the money - this circumstance of assuming green energy will crop up quickly is a supply chain issue which lies outside of the US for production of generation componentry as well as major raw materials resources for batteries and high-power solidstate circuitry products (vehicles as well as overnight storage, plus inverters for distributed gen sites) so NOT a plus to US economy absent Manufacturing which Democrat and Republican administrations have been all too happy to forsake. Obama era tax favoritism for non-coal and soon to be non-gas shifted the high development and startup costs to taxpayers nationwide while the major beneficiaries were almost exclusively in SW an South. You can bet the majority of green energy costs will be carried by transmission line as part of northern states’ power bills. There is some hope perhaps in offshore wind and wave power, but that’s got its own logistics nightmares, and northern Midwest states are pressed in that regard by geography.

Richard Smith: Phil Jadlowiec We agree to disagree and time is always on the side of change. It was a bad time when nuclear was taken off the table for the last 30 years. The waste generated from all the commercial nukes since the first one in Pennsylvania can fit easily on one normal size football field. The waste from coal fired have contaminated every river and airway in the United States. But that is not the reason to change to other forms of energy. The reason is that other forms are immensely cheaper than coal. Coal: Ya gotta dig it up, clean it up, transport it, store it, move it, burn it, clean it (smoke), move it, store it, transport it, bury it.

Wind, water, gas, oil, nuclear, and solar: build it and generate. It’s working. Plenty of jobs. Nuclear will be the clean base load in the future.

Bill Beardsley: They're only closing because sufficient numbers of cleaner more efficient natural gas fired units are handling demand. The gas fired unites require far less maintenance to run. The economic pain of progress will be rough for tradespeople that made their livings doing outage work on the coal burners.

last of 41 photos
Jill E. Lane: The ceiling is gold leaf and is very beautiful.
[And it appears that there is marble on the walls.]

Don Nichols posted three photos with the comment: "The Avon Lake power plant. I took these from a car that I was a passenger in. April 2001."

Paul Shipper: 2001 was after the Transformer blew. Got the assignment to help manage the replacement Transformer installation. It was an interesting assignment. No Procedures, worked by experience and the 'seat of your pants'. Get it back on line.

Tim Regan: Demo is in process. [Summer 2022]

Don Nichols: Phillip Christopher The first five units were shut down by FirstEnergy in 1997.

Michael Ireland commented on Don's post

Lance Aerial Media posted
More of the Ice formations in Avon Lake
Dennis DeBruler: I read last Summer that the power plant was closed Apr 1, 2022, and that it was being torn down. Is the demolition going slow or did it stop?

Lance Aerial Media posted two photos with the comment: "650 foot view."

Lance Aerial Media posted
Aerial of the Avon Lake Power Plant and proposed future state by Gensler Design - yes they are keeping the towers. Credit: Gensler

Lance Aerial Media posted seven images with the comment: "The Engineering Drawings for the Plant with Cross Section Shown, vs the real life cross section of the Avon Lake Power Plant."