North Eastern Electric Supply Company
Managing director |
The North Eastern Electric Supply Company (commonly abbreviated to NESCo) was responsible for the supply of
History
The Newcastle upon Tyne Electric Supply Company was founded in Newcastle upon Tyne, North East England, in 1889 by the industrialist John Theodore Merz.[1] The company was one of two that were founded in the Newcastle area that year, with the Newcastle and District Electric Lighting Company (DisCo) founded by Charles Algernon Parsons. A line was roughly drawn down the city's Grainger Street, with NESCo supplying the area to the east and DisCo that to the west.
NESCo opened its first power station, Pandon Dene, in 1890. Merz's son, Charles Hesterman Merz worked at the Pandon Dene station and became the company's Chief Consultant Engineer. Charles Merz's design company, Merz & McLellan, which he founded with William McLellan, undertook much of NESCo's design work from 1898 onward. They designed the pioneering Neptune Bank Power Station, which opened in 1901. It was the first power station in the United Kingdom to generate three-phase electric power, and the first to supply electricity for industrial purposes rather than just lighting. This led to the rapid expansion of NESCo, and gave the Tyneside industries an advantage over those in other areas. For the 30 years following the opening of the Neptune Bank station, NESCo became one of the World's leading companies in power station development.[2]
NESCo opened
In 1927, the company moved into their new headquarters at Carliol House in Newcastle's city centre. The building was designed by Robert Burns Dick.[3] Carliol House Ltd. had been founded in 1924 to build and administer the building itself. It remained a separate company until 1974, after the nationalisation of the company.[2]
The North Eastern Electric Supply Company was formed under the North Eastern Electric Supply Act 1932, which brought the Newcastle upon Tyne Electric Supply Company and all its subsidiaries under one company.[2] In June 1932 it bought the Durham Electrical Power Distribution Company.[4]
The British electricity industry was
References
- ^ Hughes, Thomas Parke. "Managing Change: Regional Power Systems, 1910-30" (PDF). h-net.msu.edu. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania. Retrieved 2 July 2011.
- ^ a b c d e "North Eastern Electricity Board". The National Archives. Retrieved 30 June 2011.
- ^ White, Paul J (21 October 2008). "Carliol-House". https://www.flickr.com/. Retrieved 2 January 2009.
{{cite web}}
: External link in
(help)|work=
- ^ Pears, Brian (3 August 2010). "Public Services". genuki.org.uk. Retrieved 27 June 2011.
Further reading
- Byatt, I.C.R. The British electrical industry, 1875-1914 : the economic returns to a new technology. Oxford University Press, 1979.
- Hannah, Leslie (1979). Electricity Before Nationalisation, A Study in the Development of the Electricity Supply Industry in Britain to 1948. London & Basingstoke: ISBN 0-8018-2145-2.
- McGovern, T. & McLean, T. The genesis of the electricity supply industry in Britain: a case study of NESCo from 1889 to 1914 Business history 59 2017, 667-689. (Preprint at Durham Research Online)