Plant Bowen is a coal-fired power station located just outside Euharlee, Georgia, United States, approximately 14km west-south-west from Cartersville. At over 3,200 megawatts, Plant Bowen is one of the largest coal-fired power plants in North America. The station is connected to the southeastern power grid by numerous 500 kV transmission lines, and is owned and operated by Georgia Power, a subsidiary of Southern Company.Bowen's four cooling towers are 116m tall and 97m in diameter and can cool 1100000USgal per minute. Another 26000USgal or 37 million gallons per day (MGD) of water is lost to evaporation which creates the distinctive white clouds rising from each tower.Bowen's two smokestacks are 305m tall. Particulates are removed from the exhaust gases through the use of electrostatic precipitators. The exhaust gases are then closely monitored to comply with air quality regulations. In addition, Jet Bubble Reactor (JBR) units have recently been constructed on all four units to meet federal clean air and ozone standards.IncidentsOn 4 April 2013, an explosion occurred on unit 2 while it was being removed from service and readied for a planned maintenance outage. This caused significant damage to the plant but there were no serious injuries. The explosion was attributed to a mixture of hydrogen and air in the generator, due to failure to comply with procedures.
