Premier Jeremy Rockliff has visited the fire-ravaged Tungatinah Power Station, where exposed beams have been left visible for the first time in more than 70 years.
Rockliff was joined by Hydro Tasmania chief executive Rachel Watson at the Tarraleah site today. Rockliff described a “devastating” scene.
“We’ve seen a structure that’s been here since around 1953 devastated by the events of the fire early yesterday evening,” he said.
“Quite clearly this is a devastating scene and, putting aside any technicality around heritage, this is Tasmanian heritage.”
The premier said he felt a “high degree of sadness” looking at the now-destroyed power station.
The building is now just a shell and the station is non-operational.
Watson said the site remained a live incident scene and was still under investigation.
“Clearly we’ve got a lot of work to do now,” she said. “We have to secure the site and make it very safe.”
“We have to make sure there are no environmental impacts from the fire and from the residue and we need to make sure that we can access it once Tas Fire have completed their work here.”
She said Hydro’s focus was now on supporting staff, many of whom felt the loss personally.
“We’ve got staff who … this wasn’t just a place they came to work, it actually held a special place for them … a lot of people are carrying that quite hard today.”
The station holds five turbines. Watson said it was too soon to know their condition. She said the main damage was to the fabric of the building.
A nearby TasNetworks switchyard, a key piece of state infrastructure, escaped damage, protected by a forecourt buffer between it and the burning building.
The premier said the state’s power supply was secure, pointing to water storages at their highest in a decade and gas turbine backup.
Tungatinah contributes about 5% of the state’s energy and both Hydro and TasNetworks have confirmed the network remains secure.
Hydro is yet to put a cost on the damage, though a rebuild will likely run to hundreds of millions of dollars. Watson said the station was fully insured.
Rockliff earlier told parliament the rebuild would take “at least a year, certainly many months”.
The cause of the fire is yet to be determined.
