Tampa Electric to remove two chimneys in pieces from Big Bend Power Station

Now looking to open up the skyline a bit at Apollo Beach, Florida, following the modernization of the Big Bend Power Station, Tampa Electric intends to remove two of the three chimneys at the facility.

The 500-foot-tall chimneys are legacy items made of an inner layer of bricks and an outer shell of reinforced concrete. Originally built in the 1970s, they served Big Bend Units 1, 2, and 3 for approximately 50 years. However, Big Bend Unit 1 was repowered recently with combined-cycle technology, eliminating its use of coal as a fuel source. The move represented progress in reducing carbon use and improving the land, water, and air emissions situation at Big Bend, but it also rendered the chimneys obsolete.

Owing to this, the removal of the chimneys should be completed by autumn as part of a larger five-year plant dismantlement project.

“Big Bend’s chimneys have been landmarks in Apollo Beach for decades,” Allan Williams, director of Big Bend Station, said. “This will dramatically change the landscape.”

Due to their size and construction, the chimneys will need to be removed by specialists in pieces, beginning at the top and working down. Tampa Electric added that it should be able to recover 10 percent of its construction costs through recycling and reselling some obsolete portions of the plant, recycling or selling scrap metal, and selling some old equipment on the second-hand market.

While an older chimney was removed in 2016, the facility will have one remaining in use after these latest are removed to support Big Bend Unit 4. That unit remains the sole user of natural gas or coal in the facility, allowing Big Bend to operate with a fuel mix of approximately 85 percent natural gas, nearly 10 percent solar, and 5 percent coal.