30 June 2009 12:17
A ruby celebration at Ironbridge power station

E.ON's Ironbridge power station is celebrating 40 years of electricity generation this month and, to help mark the occasion, staff welcomed past and present employees as well local dignitaries to join in the festivities.

The power station became operational on 11 June 1969 and, since that date, it has played a vital role in keeping the lights on across the region.

Richard Pennells, site manager at Ironbridge, said: "It's great to see so many old faces back on site to help us celebrate this momentous occasion.

"The power station has been at the heart of the Ironbridge community for so many years and it's wonderful to be able to take a trip down memory lane with some of the people who were there at the beginning."

Guests on the day were invited to tour the turbine hall and control room, which is where, at 4.01pm 11th June 1969- marking the exact time the station became operational - two celebratory cakes featuring Ironbridge's distinctive pink cooling towers were cut.

Richard added: "It was really important to the site team that we shared our celebrations and achievements with the local community who have provided great support over the years."

The team marked the occasion by presenting cheques to two local charities that the station regularly supports, for £4000 each to commemorate the achievement. 

The Severn Hospice, plan to use the money to complete the Library funding which has being fully funded by the station and The Community Foundation for Shropshire and Telford who use local people, with local knowledge to distribute charitable funds to local areas of need, also received a cheque.

The cheques were presented to Paul Cronin chief executive of the Severn Hospice and Mike Lowe chairman of The Community Foundation for Shropshire and Telford.

To mark the occasion, each team member received a commemorative framed print of the station, produced by local artist Caroline Ali who was also a visitor on the day.

Ironbridge is located in the Severn Gorge and is capable of generating 1,000MW of electricity enough to supply approximately 750,000 homes.

Ends

Notes to editors

• E.ON is one of the UK's leading power and gas companies - generating and distributing electricity, and retailing power and gas - and is part of the E.ON group, one of the world's largest investor-owned power and gas companies. We employ around 17,000 people in the UK and over 93,000 worldwide;
• Our distribution business, branded Central Networks, provides a reliable supply to 9.4m people in central England through 133,000km of underground and overhead cables - enough to go round the Earth more than three times - and via almost 97,000 substations. The company covers an area from the Peak District in the north to parts of Bristol in the south, and from the Welsh Borders to the Lincolnshire Coast;
• The generation business produces enough electricity to cater for the needs of around eight million homes from a portfolio of world-class gas-, coal- and oil-fired power stations;
• We are a market leader in combined heat and power, providing our customers with around 600MW of electricity and more than 1,000MW of heat at 13 sites across the country;
• We're one of the leading green generators in the UK, with 21 wind farms located from Cornwall to Northern Ireland. We own and operate one of the UK's largest dedicated biomass power stations at Lockerbie. Combined, our renewable portfolio generates enough green energy to power the homes in a city the size of Manchester;
• Our green development portfolio could power over a million homes and displace the emission of almost two million tonnes of carbon dioxide a year by building new onshore and offshore wind farms, biomass power stations, and tidal stream and wave power schemes;
• Our target is to cut the carbon released by each kW of electricity we generate by 10% between 2005-2012, having already reduced it by 20% since 1990;
• Our non-operational carbon intensity dropped by 16.7% per employee in 2006;
• We are investing £50 million in new technologies and approaches over 10 years, through the Energy Technologies Institute;

For more information contact:

Rebecca Mara on 02476 183 679

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