Pylon of the Month

Here in the UK we are reaching the end of a cold spell, so this pylon sent in a few weeks ago immediately sprang to mind as I sat down to write February's post. With spring hopefully just around the corner, it might well be the last winter-themed pylon for some time. This was not a picture taken from the side of the road - it involved a trek and a faint whiff of adventure, so I will quote from the email that sent it my way:

On the morning of Saturday, January 11th, I embarked on a journey across frozen terrain in order to take this picture...........After the long trek across streets and eventually rarely traveled hills, I reached the highest peak along this line. This point is on beside the fence separating the Oak Ridge National Laboratory from the rest of the community, which can be found on Google Maps by fallowing the D O E N Patrol Rd. The pylons shown are part of a 161 kV line running to the National Lab, and more information can be found here.

As soon as I saw the name Oak Ridge and the reference to the National Laboratory, I immediately thought of the Manhattan Project and the role that it played in seperating fissile U-235 from naturally occuring Uranium. The fact that Uranium in its natural state is  99% U-238 makes this technologically difficult and the electromagnetic seperation and gaseous diffusion techniques used at Oak Ridge were critical for the success of the project. Whilst doing a bit of reserach into this, I even discovered a link back to the UK where the prototype gaseous difffusion equipment was manufactured by Metropolitan-Vickers (MetroVick) at Trafford Park, Manchester.

After that little sidetrack, back to the pylon. The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) seems to be the main show in town when it comes to pylons and electricity so I'm guessing the ones above belong to them. According to their website, they are the nation's largest public power provider [serving] more than 10 million people with reliable, affordable and resilient energy. They even have a Transmission Line 101 guide so if you have Ever wondered about TVA transmission lines—where they go, how they’re built or planned for? You’ll want to see every installment of our informative new video series. If you live near the lines, you won’t want to miss it!

I certainly didn't want to miss them and the final video about transmission line construction is particularly recommended. Producing something similar in a UK context wouldn't be a bad idea for National grid given the number of new transmission lines planned in the UK over the next decade or so. That's all for February - see you in Spring!