55th Anniversary Day of the Apatitskaya CHPP of TGC-1

On 23 May, the Apatitskaya CHPP of TGC-1 celebrates its 55-th Anniversary. The power plant is the largest heat supply enterprise in the Murmansk Oblast and the only heat source of the cities Apatity and Kirovsk.

The Apatitskaya CHPP is the first thermal high pressure power plant in the Kola power system. It was established during the period of critical shortage of electric power in the Polar region, resulting from low water level in rivers, and was critically important for chemical industry of the region.

CHPP construction started in 1955 as the Kirovskaya GRES power plant on the basis of the former CHPP-25 of the Kirovsk chemical facility, deactivated in 1953.

During the first years, the construction faced organizational problems: frequent changes of construction directors, high staff turnover. Major work started in 1958, and on May 23, 1959 the first generator, 50 MW was commissioned and synchronized.

During over half of century of its history, the Apatitskaya CHPP increased its capacity, modernized its primary equipment and railway facilities. In 2013, large-scale retrofit of the power plant with connection of Kirovsk consumers was completed.

— Now, the Apatitskaya CHPP is the only heat provider of two large cities – Apatity and Kirovsk, –said Alexander Sobakin, Director of the Apatitskaya CHPP.– We had no reclamations during the last heating period. Our major mission is to support reliability of our equipment. We provide a large scope of work, including routine maintenance of overhauls, process control automation, deployment of power saving technologies, and reduction of environmental impact. Our first priority objective was and will be to improve the labor conditions – 700 employees work in 20 shops, third generation of power engineers is coming to work at our power plant!

Reference Information

The Apatitskaya CHPP (until 1991 – the Kirovskaya GRES power plant) belongs to the Kolskiy Branch of TGC-1 and is the only heat source of the city of Apatity. Its installed electric capacity is 266 MW, installed thermal capacity is 590 Gcal/h. The main fuel is coal.