MEGAWATT VALLEY

An exploration of the Trent Valley, the first to be given this title. At one time, the River Trent was home to thirteen power stations, and the biggest concentration of coal-fired power generation in Europe.
Its proximity to the Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, and Leicestershire coalfields, combined with its good railway networks and a strong supply of cooling water made the Trent the perfect place to expand power production in the 1950s and 1960s.
The "dash for gas" of the 1990s led to many stations being closed, decommissioned, or demolished. Government announcements in 2015 to phase out all coal-fired power generation by 2025 mean that in the near future, these monolithic features of the landscape - serving as icons of power and symbols of home - will soon be gone.