Tejo Power Station

It now houses the Museu da Electricidade (Electricity Museum) The original Tejo Power Station, whose buildings no longer exist, was built in 1909 and operated until 1921.

The second phase (from 1924 to 1928) included the first expansion of the boiler room with a new longitudinal nave, the purchase of a new generating set, construction of a coal distributor and the docks to the refrigeration circuit's channels.

After closing and nationalising the electric companies, it was decided that this old thermoelectric power station should be given new life and reopened for cultural purposes.

After continuous transformations and expansions over the years, the Tejo Power Station's architectural ensemble represents the masterful conservation of a large manufacturing structure from the first half of the 20th century.

The operating principle of a thermoelectric power station is based on the burning of fuel to produce vapour which then turns an electric current generator.

At the Tejo Power Station, the main fuel was coal, which arrived by river and was unloaded into the square with the same name in order to then be deposited in the crusher and sent to the mixing silos.

The hot steam returned to its liquid state through contact with the cold walls of the condenser's inner tubes, which carried water from the Tagus river.

Those jobs ranged from coal unloaders to the most specialised engineers and technicians, with workers in the boiler rooms and carpentry and ironwork workshops in between.

The Tejo Power Station has huge heritage value, not only in architectural or archaeological terms, but also from a historic, social, anthropological and economic perspective.

Its reach covered the entire city and the Tagus Valley, lighting up streets and homes and providing factories with power.

It was the invisible factor in the city's growth and expansion in the 20th century, the cornerstone for regional industrialisation and the first electrified railway line in the country (Lisbon – Cascais).

Several generations worked and suffered by the boilers so that others could turn on the lights in their homes, walk through artificially lit streets at night, or travel comfortably in electric trams that climbed Lisbon's precipitous slopes.

Aside from that, within the station's complex, there is also a set of assets that, by remaining intact, made this old thermoelectric power plant survive the deindustrialisation of the Belém district, thus making it unique in the country and perhaps all of Europe.