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Steam pipe dream: Cordia hopes to bring new life to Downtown Pittsburgh’s ancient underground thermal system

By District Energy posted 06-04-2023 09:27

  

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Summary

The basement of the Frick Building on Grant Street has tunnels that don’t appear on Downtown maps and have no discernable purpose. One begins at the entrance to Henry Clay Frick’s personal vault.

It is rumored that the tunnels were once used to move money between several Downtown buildings.

Soon, a different type of commerce will flow through them: hot steam.

Phoenix-based Cordia has been working for over a year to build out its steam distribution system in Uptown and to connect it to the one operated for decades by Pittsburgh Allegheny County Thermal before the latter entity dissolves.

Steam, just like water or natural gas, can be delivered by an underground distribution system.

Pittsburgh got its own district heating system in 1915.

On July 1, PACT will stop making steam and transition the vast majority of its customer load to Cordia. Then, the nonprofit cooperative will spend the next several months filling in thousands of feet of underground tunnels where its old pipelines will be buried forever.

Or, maybe just for a few years.

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