FROM BATTERSEA TO THE CLEAN AIR ACTS

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FROM BATTERSEA TO THE CLEAN AIR ACTS
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TRANSITION TO ELECTRIC POWER LOCAL INDUSTRY
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Barton A 1923 (Manchester Corporation)

• Electric Lighting Act 1888/1909 Reduced
  restrictions and LAs as generators
• Electricity (Supply) Act 1926 National grid
• Barton A scorching hedges and fruit trees

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Barton A 1923 (Manchester Corporation)

• Manchester Corporation Electricity generation
  gave smoke but their duties arose under the Man.
  Corp. Act 1914
• House of Lords (1929/1930) Overturned
  decision cannot rely on statutory powers to
  excuse a nuisance
• Shock! A decision of great
  moment

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BATTERSEA A

• London Power Company used 1926 Act
• Consent given in 1927
• Shock!

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POLLUTION WORRY FROM OUTSET

• Could attach conditions (1927)
• Chimney heights
• Gas washing
• Not practical to revoke consent

This will kill every green thing within two
miles of Battersea, rot all the buildings and
bleach all the babies. G. Fry Prime Ministers
personal secretary
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HEADLINES 1929

• FAILURE TO FORSEE
• A DEPLORABLE STEP
• SULPHUR CLOUD
• BUILDING IN SPITE OF PROTEST
• SUNLIGHT AND SMOKE
• OUTPOURINGS OF GREAT CHIMNEYS
• BATTERSEAS FOLLY

• ALARM
• THE SITE
• GAS WASHING
• FUMES MENACE
• NOXIOUS GAS
• FUME STATION

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BUILDING IN SPITE OF PROTEST

• Steel-framed building with brickwork hung from
  the outside, similar to US skyscrapers
• Construction 1929-1939
• Station B 1953-55
• Four-chimney layout

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HEADLINES 1934

• POWER
• SMOKE WITHOUT FUMES
• A RIVERSIDE NOCTURNE
• BIGGEST POWER STATION IN THE WORLD
• THE GIANT ROBOT OF BATTERSEA
• POWER
• INDUSTRYS SMOKE BECOMES BEAUTIFUL

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OVERCOMING PROTEST

• the building was too large and would be an
  eyesore, and those who were worried about the
  pollution. Ignoring the latter, the company
  addressed the former by hiring Sir Giles Gilbert
  Scott
• Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia

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COMPLAINTS GRAPH
PLANNING STAGE
CONSTRCTION AND SMOKE ABATEMENT STUDIES
CLOSURE
WW2
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WARTIME
a clear landmark for the bombers of the Luftwaffe
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TEMPLE OF POWER

• Fluted white smoke stacks
• Turbine Hall as nave

• Art Deco control room
• Italian marble turbine hall
• Polished parquet floors
• Wrought iron staircases

Architects Journal 1939 celebrities vote it
their 2nd favourite building
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PHOTOGRAPHIC COMPETITION
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SYMBOL OF PRIDE and MODERNTY
BIGGEST POWER STATION IN THE WORLD THE GIANT
ROBOT OF BATTERSEA
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STATION B 1953-55

• 1952 fog
• Scrubbing success/failure

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PAINTED
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PHOTOGRAPHED
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ICONIC STATUS
Pink Floyd Animals 1977 Songbook Album cover
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The Who Quadrophenia (1973)
Hitomi Yaida The First Reflection (2001)
Also The Orb's Adventures Beyond The Ultraworld
and Les Claypool's Frog Brigade's Live Frogs
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ICONIC STATUS
Sir Ian McKellen 1995 film version of Richard III
used the Battersea PS as a backdrop
also Alfred Hitchcock Sabotage (1936) Monty
Python's The Meaning Of Life
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CLOSURE

• 1975 Station A (out of date) was shut down
• Public pressure to save the buildings, notably
  Station A's Deco interior.
• 1980 declared a heritage site
• 1983 production in Station B ended
• Plans to construct a theme park in
  1988 folded

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SYMBOL OF COMMUNITY
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DECOMMISIONING AND DESTRUCTION
Battersea Power Station has been standing mute
defying that fate and death its rebirth and the
removal of a major central London area of blight
would re-energise this part of town
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MORE PLANS (2004)

• 24-hour destination- cinema, bars, cafes and
  shops
• 750 new flats
• twisted like ribbon building to create a
  "spectacular portal to the site"

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IRONY

• Inversion of protest
• The grid and relocation
• The loss of urban power-stations

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THE IMPORTANCE OF THE LONDON SMOG OF 1952
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WEEKLY DEATH RATE IN LONDON ADMINISTRATIVE
COUNTY 1952
SMOG WEEK
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MECHANISMS OF FOG FORMATION

• Classically related to sulfuric acid formation

HSO3- ½O2 ? SO4 H catalysed
by dissolved iron neutralised by calcium
New work considers humic like polycarboxylic
acids hygroscopic surface active
Yousef Otaibi Talib Latif UEA
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GREAT SMOG and PUBLIC IMAGES

• Cancelled buses, football
• Animals suffering
• Lost on the way home

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CRIMINALS IN THE 52 SMOG
Newspapers incorrectly reported increased crime
Tiger in the Smoke (1952) Lady in the Fog (1952)

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KRAY BROTHERS
Grateful for the fogs spent the early 1950's
dodging the Army Normally crime increased in
fogs, but in 1952 the Great Smog rendered
London virtually crime free
David Bailey
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OUTCOME as everyone knows...

• Beaver Committee
• Private Members Bill (Nabarro)
• Clean Air Act (1956)
• How many died?
• What was the role of SO2?

but...
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FACTS-FACTIONS-FICTIONS

• MacMillan (Housing)
• Gasmasks
• Mass Graves
• Delayed response

Conspiracy and cover up- driven by fading
social memory?
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CONCEALING THE DEATHS

• Contemporary analysis was fairly immediatebut
• Influenza and longer term impacts

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FACTS-FACTIONS-FICTIONS
Re-analysis can be problematical

• Deaths
• Battersea

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CLEAN AIR ACT (1956) SUCCESS OR FAILURE

• Need historic measurements

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EARLY MEASUREMENTS
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LONDON FOG and AIR POLLUTION
Day/annum
?g m-3
400
200
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INNOVATION and IMAGINATION

• What was wrong with the smoke clauses of the
  Public Health Act (1936 )?
• Challenges personal freedom by controlling what
  people could burn in their own homes

"chimney of any building..."
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STRUCTURE OF THE ACT

• Many clauses
• PHA (1936) 6
• CAA (1956) gt 40
• Detail in memoranda
• chimney heights
• smoke control areas
• industrial premises

Compare with EC/96/62 Air Quality Monitoring and
Management Directive
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DOUBTS

• Not enough smokeless fuel...

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CLEAN AIR ACT (1956) SUCCESS OR FAILURE

• Declining smoke and SO2 even outside smokeless
  zones

• Domestic transitions
• Smokeless fuels
• Slow uptake of smokeless zones in some areas
• Failure to address SO2

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IMPACT OF CAA(1956)

• Regulated smoke not SO2
• Applied in Black areas
• Implementaton often delayed

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CAA(1956) AFFECTS OUR CONCEPT OF ENVIRONMENT

• Bonfires in gardens
• Regulation of indoor spaces and furnishings

• Personal freedom and the automobile
• congestion charges
• public transport will never cope
• buses make pollution worse
• school runs - less than one in 10 parents believe
  public transport can get their children to school

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CHANGE IN LONDON

• The world and London has changed PM, winter
  NO2, summer ozone
• CAA(1956) incorporated into CAA(1993)
• Iconic status

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THE BIG SMOKE AND LONDON

• I desired to know what brought him so far from
  the big smoke
• The Cruise of the Cachalot

Cleaning up the Big Smoke Livingstone plans to
cut carbon emissions by 60 Londoners given
20-year target to go green Flights could
drastically affect success of campaign
The Guardian, February 27 2007