Holborn Viaduct power station, named the Edison Electric Light Station, was the world's first

coal-fired power station A coal-fired power station or coal power plant is a thermal power station which burns coal to generate electricity. Worldwide there are about 2,500 coal-fired power stations, on average capable of generating a gigawatt each. They generate ...

generating electricity for public use. It was built at number 57 Holborn Viaduct in central

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

, by

Thomas Edison Thomas Alva Edison (February11, 1847October18, 1931) was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices in fields such as electric power generation, mass communication, sound recording, and motion pictures. These inventions, ...

's Edison Electric Light Company. The plant began running on 12 January 1882, three years after the invention of the carbon-filament

incandescent light bulb An incandescent light bulb, also known as an incandescent lamp or incandescent light globe, is an electric light that produces illumination by Joule heating a #Filament, filament until it incandescence, glows. The filament is enclosed in a ...

. It burnt coal to drive a

steam engine A steam engine is a heat engine that performs Work (physics), mechanical work using steam as its working fluid. The steam engine uses the force produced by steam pressure to push a piston back and forth inside a Cylinder (locomotive), cyl ...

which drove a , generator which produced

direct current Direct current (DC) is one-directional electric current, flow of electric charge. An electrochemical cell is a prime example of DC power. Direct current may flow through a conductor (material), conductor such as a wire, but can also flow throug ...

(DC) at 110 volts. It initially lit 968 16-

candle A candle is an ignitable candle wick, wick embedded in wax, or another flammable solid substance such as tallow, that provides light, and in some cases, a Aroma compound, fragrance. A candle can also provide heat or a method of keeping time. ...

incandescent lamps to provide street lighting from Holborn Circus to St. Martin's Le Grand, which was later expanded to 3,000 lamps. The power station also provided electricity for private residences, which may have included nearby Ely Place. Having run at a significant loss the station closed in September 1886, and the lamps were converted back to gas. Edison opened a second coal-fired power station in September 1882 in the United States, at

Pearl Street Station Pearl Street Station was Thomas Edison's first commercial power plant in the United States. It was located at 255–257 Pearl Street in the Financial District of Manhattan in New York City, just south of Fulton Street on a site measuring . The ...

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

Background

In 1878, the

City of London Corporation The City of London Corporation, officially and legally the Mayor and Commonalty and Citizens of the City of London, is the local authority of the City of London, the historic centre of London and the location of much of the United Kingdom's f ...

had installed 16 electric arc lamps over the viaduct, but the experiment was discontinued within six months, and the bridge returned to

gas lighting Gas lighting is the production of artificial light from combustion of a fuel gas such as methane, propane, butane, acetylene, ethylene, hydrogen, carbon monoxide, coal gas (town gas) or natural gas. The light is produced either directly by ...

. The Victoria Embankment was lit with electric lamps at around the same time, using the Yablochkov candles demonstrated at the Exposition Universelle in Paris in 1878. The Holborn Viaduct project was preceded by two months by an electricity supply from a

water wheel A water wheel is a machine for converting the kinetic energy of flowing or falling water into useful forms of power, often in a watermill. A water wheel consists of a large wheel (usually constructed from wood or metal), with numerous b ...

in Godalming, Surrey – the world's first public electricity supply. This hydroelectric project was on a much smaller scale, however, with a generator running 4 arc lamps and 27 incandescent lamps.

Location and technical specification

Lacking the legal precedent to lay underground cables (digging the street was the sole prerogative of the gas companies), Edison's associate

Edward Hibberd Johnson Edward Hibberd Johnson (January 4, 1846 – September 9, 1917) was an inventor and business associate of American inventor Thomas Alva Edison. He was involved in many of Edison's projects, and was a partner in an early organization which evolved ...

discovered culverts existed on the Holborn Viaduct which would allow for electrical cables to be laid. The American-built 'Jumbo' generator (named after P.T. Barnum's circus elephant) was driven by a Porter-Allen steam engine built by

Babcock & Wilcox Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises, Inc. is an American energy technology and service provider that is active and has operations in many international markets with its headquarters in Akron, Ohio. Historically, the company is best known for their stea ...

Closure

The station was on Crown property and so could not be extended, and was running at a significant annual loss. It closed in September 1886 and the lamps were converted back to gas. The building in which it was housed was destroyed by bombing during

the Blitz The Blitz (English: "flash") was a Nazi Germany, German bombing campaign against the United Kingdom, for eight months, from 7 September 1940 to 11 May 1941, during the Second World War. Towards the end of the Battle of Britain in 1940, a co ...

, and the large building called 60 Holborn Viaduct has since subsumed the site.

References

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