South West Transformer Yard at White Bay Power Station, rail lines run between two industrial buildings, half-buried.
South West Transformer Yard at White Bay Power Station, rail lines run between two industrial buildings, half-buried.

South West Transformer Yard

Provenance

Camera
NIKON D7000
Lens
14.0-24.0 mm f/2.8
Settings
21mm · f/8.0 · 1/100 · ISO 160
Paper
Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm

The rail corridor through the South West Transformer Yard, rusted tracks running between the switch house and the buildings beyond. The yard held distribution transformers that stepped voltage for different parts of the network. Nature has been advancing across the yard since the 1983 shutdown.

Edition
Open edition

Open edition
Printed to order, no fixed quantity. Each print is hand-signed by the photographer.

Limited edition
A fixed number of prints exist. Once sold, the edition closes permanently. Each print is individually numbered and signed.

$100.00 AUD
Size
Type
Colour
✓
Signed, numbered, with COA. Made to order in 10 to 20 business days (framed). Shipped in protective packaging with edition certificate, paper-stock reference and a printed care guide.
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In situ

South West Transformer Yard at White Bay Power Station, rail lines run between two industrial buildings, half-buried.South West Transformer Yard at White Bay Power Station, rail lines run between two industrial buildings, half-buried.South West Transformer Yard at White Bay Power Station, rail lines run between two industrial buildings, half-buried.South West Transformer Yard at White Bay Power Station, rail lines run between two industrial buildings, half-buried.South West Transformer Yard at White Bay Power Station, rail lines run between two industrial buildings, half-buried.
01 PROVENANCE

Print datasheet

Title
South West Transformer Yard
Series
White Bay Power Station
Catalogue
WBP-065
Process
Giclée
Captured
13 November 2015
Camera
NIKON D7000
Lens
14.0-24.0 mm f/2.8
Aperture
f/8.0
Shutter
1/100 s
ISO
160
Focal length
21 mm
Paper
Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm
Paper size
290 × 200 mm
Location
Rozelle, New South Wales, Australia
Authenticity
C2PA verified provenance →
Recognised by
Highly Commended in Multimedia at the 2016 National Trust of Australia (NSW) Heritage Awards
02 LOCATION

Rozelle, New South Wales, Australia

Map · Mapbox · OpenStreetMap

03 THE STORY

About this print

The south-west transformer yard at White Bay Power Station is an open compound containing a row of large oil-immersed power transformers on concrete plinths, each unit enclosed in a corrugated steel tank with cooling fins or radiator banks on the sides. Oil-filled cable boxes are fitted at the base of each transformer where the underground cables enter. Porcelain bushings on the high-voltage side extend upward, the terminals connected to the overhead line structure above the compound. A steel and concrete blast wall separates the individual transformer bays. The compound fence is steel palisade. Overhead gantry steel carries the conductors between the transformer high-voltage terminals and the site switchgear.

Transformer yards at White Bay Power Station stepped the station's generated voltage up for transmission and down for distribution to the tram and rail substations. White Bay's output was distributed to substations throughout the Sydney tramway and railway network, which required voltage transformation at several points in the circuit. The station was built by the NSW Government Railways from 1912 and the transformer yards were developed across the A, B, and C Station phases completed between 1912 and 1948. After the Christmas Day 1983 shutdown and formal decommissioning in 1984, the transformer yards were included in the 1990s decontamination works. The south-west yard's surviving equipment reflects the plant's final operational configuration.

04 FROM THE FIELD NOTES

Rail lines run between two industrial buildings, half-buried under rubble and broken slate. Concrete transformer plinths sit along the base of the turbine hall, disconnected from anything. The hall's rendered facade rises three storeys on the left, louvre windows broken or missing, rust stains streaking down from steel frames. Opposite, a lower brick building holds its shape. Between them, dense green scrub pushes in from the far end, swallowing the corridor where it narrows.

Brett Patman

White Bay Power Station

The series

White Bay Power Station

2015–2018 · 124 photographs

Bricklayers laid 3.7 million bricks at White Bay across three and a quarter years of Phase 1 construction, on Wanngal Country at the western edge of Rozelle. The New South Wales Government Railways ran the build through its own Construction Department. By 3 July 1913, boilers and alternators were running before the buildings that housed them were complete.

View all in this series →

05 SIZE GUIDE

Print sizes

The anatomy view shows what this finish is as a physical object: paper margin, mat band, frame depth, acrylic profile. The comparison strip shows how each size sits relative to the others at true scale. Click a size or a finish to update both.

Anatomy · true ratio
07 MORE FROM WHITE BAY POWER STATION

123 other prints in this series

All prints
Control Room at White Bay Power Station, a curved control console wraps across the room in a wide arc.
Control Room $100.00
Turbine Hall at White Bay Power Station, reinforced concrete walls rise three storeys on each side, their surfaces stained.
Turbine Hall $100.00
Glass Curtain at White Bay Power Station, a towering mosaic of glass and steel, where light filters through dust-streaked.
Glass Curtain $100.00
Turbine and Condenser at White Bay Power Station, a steam turbine and its condenser sit on the operating floor of White Bay.
Turbine and Condenser $100.00
08 BY POST · NO SPAM

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