BS: New UK Pylon Designs

Subject: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 04:41 AM

I've always had a strong affection for the Traditional British Pylon; it's a design classic on a truly gargantuan scale. How I love these benign skeletal behemoths that bestrides our Green & Pleasant Countryside truly bringing power to the people. Hell, we even used one on the back cover of our (ahem) new album, to acknowlege that all Folklore emerges from our interaction with landscape and enviroment in terms of a more integrated sense of Tradition, Community and available Technology. Thus the pylon is iconic to our culture, an unchanging feature as perfect as our beloved trees, castles, churches, stone circles, ley lines, wind mills and telegraph poles. Now, it seems, in a stunning piece of post-post-modern propagandising, they're suddenly considered 'dated', and new designs have been called for. See them here:

Shortlisted designs for a new generation of electricity pylons - in pictures

Must our precious and ancient pylons go the way of our pillar boxes, phone boxes, and other lost treasures of our traditional urban & rural landscapes? Do any of these sci-fi monstronsities truly pass muster in an age where, quite franky, there are more important things to worry about? The true beauty of the Traditional Pylon is that by its very ubiquity we can ignore it; they are, in effect, invisible by their familiarity, and if we must persist with an overground national grid (see HERE for the feasibility of undergrounding high power cables) then the last thing we want is drawn attention to the bloody things. Heavens, our landscapes are blighted enough by these wretched & woeful wind-turbines (whose sole purpose would seem to wave in a new generation of nuclear power by proving that renewable energy is inefficient!) without inflicting further sculptural horrors upon it.

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: gnu
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 06:07 AM

Ahhhh, but there is money to be made with flowery language and an aloof attitude. That is to say, by architects. I appreciate the designs, save the Totem, but I believe the cheapest is the best on accouta I are a injuneer. Besides, how would you climb some of those for close inspections?

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: theleveller
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 06:52 AM

Stephen Spender described tham as..."bare like giant nude girls that have no secret." Hey, whatever floats your boat, Steve.

BTW, I disagree about wind turbines - I find them beautiful and, framed against the backdrop of Drax power station, an interesting juxstaposition of generational ideas on power generation.

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: Zen
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 07:35 AM

Hmmm... here in the part of Scotland I live in there is a great debate raging about new 200 foot behemoths replacing existing 100 foot pylons going through an area of scenic beauty and historical importance.

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 08:25 AM

Pylon at Wyre Estuary Country Park, Stanah (see OP).

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: Paul Burke
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 12:57 PM

Underground power distribution? Not in their back yard!

Jim Dunckley from the Safe Haven Network said: "This was a forest at one point in time and it was reclaimed farmland and it's been completely ripped up and devastated.

"We want to highlight the ecological damage that the National Grid are doing to the environment, not just along here, but along the pipeline route."

I'm inclined to agree with him. The footprint of pylons is very light in the long term, whereas digging huge trenches across the landscape could devastate wildlife, drainage and archaeology. From the National Grid technical paper:

For direct buried cables each cable needs to be well-spaced from others for good heat dissipation. To match overhead line thermal performance for a 400 kV double circuit as many as 12 separate cables in four separate trenches may be needed resulting in a cable swathe of up to 40m.

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 02:30 PM

Yep, pretty ghastly poncy for the sake of it. Exactly what I'd expect architects to produce.

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 05:40 PM

Just seen a feature on the news. I'm sorry if I gave the impression up there I was in favour of undergrounding; nothing could be further from the truth. I love the functionality of landscape & to me pylons are as much a part of that landscape as anything else. What I am in favour of is a de-centralisation of power generation (in which even crappy wind-turbines might come in handy) (respect what theleveller says though) (and I love Drax) (and Ferrybridge) (and mourn Blyth A & B as much I would if they demolished Durham Cathedral). No nukes at any cost.

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: gnu
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 06:58 PM

I know I have already said my piece regarding architects driving up the price (of which they will kickback a chunk to the politicians that hire them to fleece the public based on inane statements such as are proferred in the first link) but I just wanna say one more thing... about "underground". It's wonderful when it works forever. But it's a major bitch when it doesn't. It's kinda like yer lectricky-ty... sneaky... ya can't see it until it reaches out and grabs ya by the booboo.

Don't get me wrong. I don't know much about yer potential energy. All I know is that I rubbed a balloon on my hair and stuck it to a wall when I was a boy. But I figger that's why I went bald. Sneaky shit I say. Best take care with that there stuff.

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: michaelr
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 07:16 PM

Oh, I don't know - some of those designs are quite attractive in a Jetsons sort of way.

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: gnu
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 07:20 PM

I agree they are attractive but they are not economical or practical.

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 16 Sep 11 - 05:54 AM

I love the Jetsons too, but how dated the future looks now.

If you're going to adopt a more scuptural approach to pylon design, then why not have it so that each one is a different? This way millions of artists could be invited to Design a Pylon, reflecting the diversity of culture in a time whem Mass Production is maybe not so desirable. For sure, one of these new designs might look nice, but seeing them in multiples soon gets wearying on the eye...

Undergrounding is as impractical as it dewstructive; it beggars belief that 'conservationists' are so enthusiastic about it - long term, short term, it's completely unworkable.

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: JHW
Date: 16 Sep 11 - 06:19 AM

I've always rather liked the French wing shaped supports, (bit like these) none here but one quite like them. Rather like the 'totem' but don't believe it would work. One of the 'sail's might look ok but not a row of them.
As an Electrical Engineer I'd remind all that the current widely used largely Blaw Knox design is a TOWER not a Pylon.
cf The Blackpool Pylon and the Eiffel Pylon. Equally a Pole is not a Pylon!

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 16 Sep 11 - 09:41 AM

Undergrounding is, I take it, a new word for burying?

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: theleveller
Date: 16 Sep 11 - 10:53 AM

"(and I love Drax) (and Ferrybridge)"

Can't say I'm too keen on Drax myself (apart from the cooling towers, which are iconic). Perhaps familiarity breeds contempt but it always strikes me as grubby, shabby and rather boring. Eggborough, on the other hand, is a different proposition. It reminds me, for some reason, of Mervyn Peake's description of the modernist landscape in the last of the Gormenghast trilogy, Titus Alone. Ferrybridge, I'd agree, is unassailable.

What I like most about pylons is the music they make.

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 16 Sep 11 - 11:12 AM

Maybe I'm mistaking Drax for something else; or something else for Drax?? I last saw it a few weeks back coming over from Beveley to York way off in the distance; I took a picture from the car window, but it wasn't very good...

Drax???

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: theleveller
Date: 16 Sep 11 - 11:38 AM

Yes, that's Drax. Looks better from a distance. I'm talking about when you actually drive past it. What is beautiful are the steam formations, especially when they catch the sun - like a manufactured cloud system.

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: Paul Burke
Date: 16 Sep 11 - 12:16 PM

If only it was as easy as burying transmission cables. The main reason we transmit power high up is to keep us shockable types away from the very high voltages used, 132000 volts, 275000 volts or 400000 volts on the main grid routes in the UK. There's a very good reason for the high voltage- the power that's delivered is volts multiplied by current. If the volts go up, the current goes down. And current in wires heats them, which wastes some power. The high voltage means that they need very good insulation. Air is a very good insulator, even when it's a bit moist, and the National Grid is surprisingly efficient- only about 3% of the power is wasted.

You can reduce the watage by making the cables thicker, but the two best conductors are copper and silver- very expensive and phenominally expensive respectively. So it's better to put up thin cables, with relatively cheap steel towers to support them, up in the air where they are naturally cooled, than to put thick cables underground, where the heat is kept in by insulation and soil.

In addition to the environmental destruction caused by burying the cables, there is the problem of fields. There is a widespread belief that electric fields from transmission lines cause diseases, though studies have found no detectable effects in humans. But if the cables are buried, the electric field may be smaller, but the magnetic field will be proportionally greater, and much closer. And magnetic fields have proven effects on the brain.

I quite like some pylons- someone mentioned the French style for example- but even if you don't, the visual impact is a small price for having electricity delivered so plentifully, safely and cheaply.

Subject: RE: BS: New UK Pylon Designs
From: gnu
Date: 16 Sep 11 - 01:50 PM

"the French style" is not a good one in regard to life cycle and maintenance. Higher initial cost and high cost of matenance when stress fatigue sets in. Having said that, yes, maintanance may be YEARS down the road, but it will eventually come. That's why we do life cycle cost-benefit analyses.

Did I mention I don't get along with artitects? Give me some true corners and I am a happy engineer. An obtuse angle is not acute angle to me. I once told an architect I couldn't fit the required reinforced concrete in the space he had allowed in his design. He said I "had" to or he would find someone who could. I dunno what happened after I walked out of the meeting.

I believe that, sometimes, ugly just makes good sense... even when it's not YOUR money you are spending. Of course, as a P.Eng., I took an oath that binds me to that way of thinking.