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Con-Ed Powerhouses

In the early 1800s, a company opened in New York City to provide gas to the lights that lit up the city. Over the next one-hundred years, New York Gas Light Company bought up and merged with many other energy providers to become one of the largest energy providers in New York. In 1936, the company purchased Thomas Edison's lighting company, thus becoming Consolidated Edison, or, as it's better known, Con-Ed. In 1999 the public utilities commission forced Con-Ed to sell off some of its holdings to break up the monopoly, but it is still one of the largest power companies in America.

Today, Con-Ed provides electricity, steam and natural gas to millions of customers in the state of New York and customers in a couple of the states that border it. Two of the largest Con-Ed powerhouses were sold in 1999. They were the Astoria Powerhouse in Queens and the Arthur Kill Powerhouse on Staten Island. Consolidated Energy still has about nine powerhouses in the city and around the state. They include: Indian Point Station, Buchanan; Hells Gate, Bronx; Ravenswood, Queens; Hudson Avenue, Brooklyn; 59th Street, New York City; Waterside, New York City; East River, 14th Street, New York City; 74th Street, New York City; and Kent Avenue, Brooklyn.

There's a lot of heat in the production of the services these power stations provide. An insulator was needed when these facilities were built that was cheap, flexible, and resistant to heat and flame. The answer came in the form of a mineral composed of long, thin crystals. Asbestos is found in naturally occurring deposits all over the world. Not only is it resistant to heat and flames, but also to electricity, and, as an added bonus, it helps deaden sound.

Each powerhouse contains miles of hot water pipes and tons of electrical cable. Asbestos was used to insulate both. It was also used to insulate the turbines which generate the power and the boilers used to make steam. A lot of the clothing that the workers wore to protect them from the heat was even made from asbestos. Some of the workers in the powerhouses spent decades working in and around asbestos. While asbestos was cheap and easy to use, exposure to the dust is very dangerous for people.

Asbestos becomes hazardous when it starts floating in the air. The mineral breaks apart and crumbles very easily which produces a dust that contains millions of microscopic asbestos fibers. Anybody working in the area who isn't wearing protective breathing gear will inhale and swallow these fibers. The fibers sit in the body and start to cause irreparable harm. It can take anywhere from twenty to fifty years for the damage to show up. Asbestosis and mesothelioma are the two most common diseases that are associated with asbestos exposure. Asbestosis is a scarring in the lungs that comes from the fibers scratching up the delicate tissues. After a while, the scarring can become so bad that the victim can't breathe. Mesothelioma is a deadly cancer that affects the lining that covers and protects most of the vital organs in the body. These individuals also have a higher risk of contracting lung cancer.

The use of asbestos had been banned, at least for the most part, by the early 1980s. It's still used in some areas, but only under tightly controlled conditions and in very specific amounts. Once the public became aware of the actual dangers of asbestos exposure, many companies put programs in place to get rid of existing products that had asbestos used in their manufacture. Con-Ed was no exception. In 1989 they started a program to remove asbestos from all of the steam manholes on the streets of New York City to protect the public. There are also regulations put in place by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) regarding workplace asbestos and its abatement.

During 1992 there was a series of cases involving hundreds of men who had worked in some of Con-Ed's powerhouses installing insulation between the 1920s and 1970s. Millions of dollars were awarded to the workers and their families. In 2003 about $47 million was awarded to a former Con Ed boilermaker who was suffering form mesothelioma and only had months to live. There are still problems associated with asbestos that had been used in various locations. As recently as 2007, asbestos was found at the site of an explosion that occurred in an underground steam pipe.

If you or someone you know has ever worked on one of the Con Ed powerhouses, you (or they) may have been exposed to asbestos. Make sure to let your doctor know that you suspect that you may have been exposed to asbestos. There is no cure for either asbestosis or mesothelioma. Some treatments may be able to extend the life of the victims, but the key to even partially successful treatments is early diagnosis.

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