PGE Prepares to Take Down Trojan Cooling Tower

Photo Courtesy: State of Oregon

(RAINIER AP) - Portland General Electric says it is nearly ready for the destruction of the 499-foot cooling tower at Trojan Nuclear Plant, scheduled for May 21st.

The hourglass-shaped structure is a Columbia River landmark north of Saint Helens and a reminder of Oregon's only nuclear power plant.

Trojan closed in 1993 after 17 years, and P-G-E has gradually phased out the facilities there.

Trojan is the first large-scale commercial nuclear plant to be decommissioned in the United States and the cooling tower the largest to be destroyed.

Controlled Demolition, Incorporated, which brought down the Kingdome in Seattle, will use two-thousand tons of explosives to bring down 41-thousand tons of steel and cement.

It should take about eight seconds. The tower never housed radioactive materials.