About ESB
Our history, our people and our principles
Poolbeg
- Location: Pigeon House Road, Ringsend, Dublin 4
- Technology: Natural Gas with distillate as an emergency back-up
- Capacity: 470MW
- Commissioned: 1971 & 1994/1996
Situated on the south bank of the River Liffey, Poolbeg Generating Station has been a feature of the Dublin landscape for decades.
Electricity generation commenced on the site in 1903 with the Pigeon House Power Station. This was owned by the City of Dublin Electricity Works and supplied most of Dublin's electricity until the 1950s.
In 1971, the first two Units of Pigeon House 'B' became Poolbeg Generating Station. Each unit comprised 120MW Brown Boveri steam turbines and generators supplied with steam from Fives-Penhoet heavy fuel oil fired boilers.
In 1976, Poolbeg Unit 3, a 271MW Alsthom turbine and generator fed by a MAN 'Benson type' oil fired boiler, was commissioned.
In 1984 the generating station was converted to burn natural gas from the Kinsale gas field. Ten years later, a 150MW Siemens V94.2 gas turbine was commissioned, and 1996 saw the installation of a second 150MW Siemens V94.2 gas turbine, both for open cycle operation.
In 2000, these were converted to combined cycle operation along with two waste heat recovery boilers and a 170MW steam turbine. This brought the station's thermal efficiency to over 52% and overall output to 980MW.
On 31 March 2010, Poolbeg Units 1, 2 and 3 were retired, leaving the station’s maximum output at 470MW.
