Boiler House Flues

Light green paint peels back from the brick walls of the boiler house at Portland Cement Works, revealing red masonry beneath. At mid level sit two arched window recesses, the left partly bricked up, the right holding a broken pane. Higher up, three grid-paned windows admit diffuse winter light across a stained concrete floor. The photograph records the room as it stood in 2018, stripped of any operational context. The works behind them had a longer history than most people would guess from looking at what remains. Lime production on the site began in 1863 under Thomas Murray, who constructed the first kilns at what would become the town of Portland. It was not until 1902, under the Commonwealth Portland Cement Company and its managing director Dr August Wilhelm Karl Scheidel, that the modern works came into production. Scheidel, a metallurgist trained at Freiberg University in Germany, brought rotary kiln technology to the site that was, at the time, at the leading edge of cement manufacturing in the world. By 1912 the works was producing approximately 40% of all Portland cement manufactured in Australia. Peak workforce reached 608 employees in 1911. The plant ran through two world wars, the Great Depression, multiple ownership changes, and a transition from dry to wet manufacturing process in the early 1950s. Cement production continued until November 1991, with the last limestone quarry decommissioned in 1998. The boiler house the photograph records is part of what remains of that 89-year production run. The Portland Cement Works Precinct was listed on the NSW State Heritage Register in August 2012. The building stands inside a site that is heritage-listed, privately owned, and under active redevelopment planning as of 2018 when this photograph was made.