Power plant open house

We had the first frost of the season early Friday morning. Summer ended very abruptly this year.

On Wednesday the power house had an open house as part of Public Power Week. I have lived in Rensselaer for more than 40 years and have never been in the building, so I was excited to go. We entered from the north into a large room that contains the tools the workers use. One of their jobs is to do maintenance on City vehicles when there is no need to generate power, so the tools are not just used for working on the engines that the power house contains.

Tucked away in the back of this room is a small room that serves as a control center. Someone can monitor the entire plant from this room. It also seems to serve as a break room.

Leaving the tool room and going to the south, we met engine 5, the oldest engine in the building. The City numbers engines by when they entered service and the first four are no longer in use. Engine 5 was built by Nordberg and was installed in 1950. Except for testing, which must be done periodically, it is not used. However, if the City lost power, it would be the first engine started because it does not need to have various pumps working before it starts. With the power it generated, the other engines could be prepped for start and then it would probably be shut down. 

The next engine, #15, is the newest and is the one that normally runs when the City generates. It has a pretty blue color and operates only on natural gas. It uses spark plugs.

There are four more engines in the plant. The picture below shows the generator on one of them. This one runs on diesel, as do the other two that are painted gray. The generators use electromagnets, so they need electricity to produce electricity. The engine spins coils of wire in the magnetic field and the result is an electrical current.

There are two identical engines that were installed in the 1960s. Both now run on diesel but at one time they could also run on natural gas. They could again run on natural gas if the proper modifications were made.

All the engines have two big ducts attached to them. One is the exhaust duct and the other brings in air from the outside. Like any engine, these need air for combustion to take place.

The final engine is a dual natural gas/diesel fuel engine. It will be run if more electricity is needed than the blue engine can provide. The power plant has the capacity to provide all the electricity that the City needs, but as a member of IMPA, it purchases all of it power from IMPA. The plant produced when IMPA needs additional power, which is why you will hear the engine or engines running on hot days, when everyone is drawing power because they have their air conditioners on.

The City website has basic information about the power plant here.