Dunston Power Station

With the expansion of the electric supply industry in the early 1900s, power stations were built to supply homes with electric lighting. Around Newcastle upon Tyne this led to the construction of power stations at Lemington, The Close and Carville. Two supply companies built the stations, the Newcastle-upon-Tyne Electric Supply Company (NESCo) to the east of Newcastle, and the Newcastle and District Electric Lighting Company (DisCo) to the west. To meet an increasing demand for electricity, NESCo commissioned Dunston Power Station (later Dunston A Power Station) on the Derwent Haugh, a large flood plain to the west of Gateshead, to balance the supply of the Newcastle area with the Carville…

The station was of a similar design to other local power stations at Carville and Lemington, and was a large triple-gabled brick building. However Dunston A was built several years after the other local stations, and so because of advances in power station design, was larger and was able to produce more electricity than the others. The station was originally equipped with two turbo-alternators rated at 7.2 megawatts (MW), made by AEG of Germany, and two turbo alternators rated at 6.25 MW and 13.2 MW, made by Brown Boveri of Switzerland, for a total generating capacity of 33.85 MW. The turbo alternators were supplied with steam from 24 coal burning Babcock & Wilcox marine water-tube boilers.