Orlando Power Station is a decommissioned coal-fired power station in

Soweto Soweto () is a township of the City of Johannesburg Metropolitan Municipality in Gauteng, South Africa, bordering the city's mining belt in the south. Its name is an English syllabic abbreviation for ''South Western Townships''. Formerly a s ...

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

. The power station was commissioned at the end of the Second World War and served

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu and xh, eGoli ), colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, or "The City of Gold", is the largest city in South Africa, classified as a megacity, and is one of the 100 largest urban areas in the world. According to Demo ...

for over 50 years.

History

Planning for the construction of Orlando started in 1935, as the electricity demand of Johannesburg was rising faster than what could be met with the existing City Generating Station located in downtown Johannesburg. The location for the station was selected due to its proximity to water supply for coolant and railway lines for the delivery of coal. Construction started in 1939 with

Merz & McLellan Merz and McLellan was a leading British electrical engineering consultancy based in Newcastle. History The firm was founded by Charles Merz and William McLellan in Newcastle upon Tyne in 1902 when McLellan joined Merz's existing firm establishe ...

as consulting engineers, but completion was delayed due to the outbreak of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. The last phase of construction was completed in 1955. Until 1990 two Robert Stephenson & Hawthorns saddle-tank steam engines (Nos. 7805 ''Elizabeth'' an 0-6-0ST and 7398 ''George'' an 0-4-0ST were used to move incoming coal trains through a wagon tipper at the power plant. The station was decommissioned in 1998 after 56 years of service. In 2006 work was started to transform the site of the power station into an entertainment and business centre. On 25 June 2014, the decommissioned power plant collapsed, killing 1 and trapping 5 others in the rubble.

Cooling towers

The two cooling towers are a prominent landmark in Soweto. They were built in 1951 to supplement the spray pond cooling system as this source of cooling was running at its capacity. Being supplied by sewage effluent from the Klipspruit Sewage Works, the spray ponds at Orlando were the first in South Africa to make use of this ready supply of coolant liquid. Both towers are painted, one functioning as an advertising

billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...

and the other containing the largest mural painting in South Africa. The towers are also used for bungee and BASE jumping from a platform between the top of the two towers as well as a bungee swing into one of the towers.

In film and TV

The tower was used for a

Fast Forward To fast-forward is to move forwards through a recording at a speed faster than that at which it would usually be played, for example two times or two point five times. The recordings are usually audio, video or computer data. It is colloquially ...

on the seventh season of ''

The Amazing Race ''The Amazing Race'' is an adventure reality game show franchise in which teams of two people race around the world in competition with other teams. The ''Race'' is split into legs, with teams tasked to deduce clues, navigate themselves in forei ...

''. The task was for one team (Ray & Deana in particular) to walk across a suspension bridge spanning one of the cooling towers 30 storeys above the ground. In the movie '' Chappie'' the power station is the headquarter of the protagonists, the two iconic cooling towers and the main building are decorated with typical

Die Antwoord Die Antwoord (, Afrikaans for "The Answer") is a South African alternative hip hop group formed in Cape Town in 2008. The group comprises rappers Watkin Tudor "Ninja" Jones and Anri "Yolandi Visser" du Toit, a male/female duo, and producers H ...

artwork. The towers also appeared on the Dutch television series ''

Wie is de Mol? ''Wie is de Mol?'' (''English'': ''Who is the Mole?'') is a Dutch adventure reality game show. It is based on the Belgian reality game show '' De Mol'', the original version of the format created in 1998 by Woestijnvis and broadcast on VRT. Fo ...

'' where contestants in the premiere of the show's thirteenth season bungee jumped off of the towers. The towers were mentioned in the Season 3, Episode 5 episode of

Wild Things with Dominic Monaghan ''Wild Things with Dominic Monaghan'' is a wildlife documentary series commissioned by Channel 5 and BBC America and presented by actor Dominic Monaghan, who also serves as an executive producer for the show. Each hour-long episode follows Monagha ...

References

External links

OrlandoTowers
{{Power in South Africa , state=expanded Coal-fired power stations in South Africa Buildings and structures in Soweto Economy of Johannesburg

History

Cooling towers

In film and TV

See also

References

External links