Civil Engineering heritage: Scotland - Lowlands and Borders
Date 2007
Event ID 605694
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/605694
The Bonnington Hydro scheme on the Clyde, about four miles from Lanark, was constructed in the mid-1920s and opened in December 1927. It was the first major hydroelectric project for the public supply of electricity in Scotland. The scheme utilises the head or height of water provided by two of the Falls of Clyde, Bonnington Linn and Cora Linn. Water is abstracted at intakes above the falls by automatically adjusted tilting weirs, and conveyed by tunnels 10 ft in diameter, totalling some 1200 yards in length, to the power station downstream where twin turbo-alternators produce 9.8MW of electricity. The working head of water in the Bonnington scheme is 189 ft, and for Stonebyres, 98 ft.
The project was designed by Buchan & Partners of Edinburgh, and the contractors were Sir William Arrol & Co., and the English Electric Company.
R Paxton and S Shipway 2007
Reproduced from 'Civil Engineering heritage: Scotland - Lowlands and Borders' with kind permission of Thomas Telford Publishers.
