What Might Have Been
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This is not as bad as the story of
Bellefonte, because this development didn't
get anywhere near complete. As part of TVA's aggressive nuclear
development program, this would have been a four unit plant, each unit
good for about 1200 Megawatts, from what sketchy information is still
available. I (Pat) seem to recall that this was to be a Boiling Water plant
as opposed to a Pressurized Water plant, but see previous comments about
my memory. Anyway, it's a moot point, because this cooling tower seems to
be the only structure that got completed.
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TVA now just maintains most of the site for storage and training. But,
if you believe the local conspiracy theorists, all sorts of "black
ops" are going on here. Why, there has even been a bigfoot
sighting nearby! Supposedly there was an "Electromagnetic Pulse Weapon
Test" here that knocked the local AM radio station off the air, and
fried the telephones at the local newspaper, violating their first
amendment rights... Give us a break! The bigfoot sighting pretty much
establishes the caliber of this crap, which is why we decline to provide
any links to the garbage. If you are interested in this tripe, just do a
search on "Hartsville", but please don't share your findings
with us... we are not interested!
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The real story here is how much coal would not have been burned to produce the
4800 plus Megawatts this plant would have been good for. Its not visible
in the picture above, but behind the buildings is what would have been a
500KV transmission tower, without any wires. We saw more of this
"line" when coming back to Edgar Evins State Park from
Nashville on I-40. That's when it sinks in what we have lost.
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Here Jan surveys the not pretty scene.
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Visible behind the fence to the right of the cooling tower is what would
have been two of the containment buildings. The plant was actually
going to be configured as two 2 unit plants located right next to each
other.
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A thoroughly depressing visit...
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