Bath Refuse Destructor
Constructed for Bath Corporation.
1896 The work was tendered for in two contracts, one for the chimney and foundations, and the second for the destructor and destructor buildings. Goddard, Massey and Warner of Nottingham, secured both contracts, but the brickwork and general building work was sublet to Jacob Long and Sons of Bath. 'The works are situated between the Bristol-road and the river, and thus have two levels; there being a high-level roadway into the works, which enables the refuse to be brought to the required position for handling, whilst material can be taken away by water. .... The heated gases or products of combustion are taken by flues to the boiler-house, where they are used for generating steam. The boiler-house is 15 ft. wide by 24 ft. 9 in. long. The boiler is of the cylindrical multitubular type,specially designed for the purpose. It is 14 ft. long and 8 ft. in diameter. There is a steam dome 6 ft. high by 2 ft. in diameter. There are 120 tubes. This boiler is said to be the largest in England that is used for the purpose. There is a by-pass flue which may be used if it is not desirable to heat the boiler. In the engine-house adjoining the engine is placed. The cylinders are 10 in. in diameter by 20 in. stroke. It drives a mortar mill and a clinker The latter is used for breaking up the cakes produced in the destructor furnace, and it also is useful for flattening old buckets and tins that may have passed through the furnace without melting. It consists of three massive cast-iron rollers, and somewhat resembles the cane mills used at sugar works for squeezing juice from cane, but differs in the top roller having projections which break the clinker into pieces of given size without crushing it to powder. .....'[1]
The site was accessed from the north by Upper Bristol Road. In 1905 access was provided from the south by the construction of the Destructor Bridge, Bath, which crossed the River Avon. The iron bridge had been constructed c.1870 to serve the the Midland Railway's new Bath Green Park Railway Station.
The site is now occupied by the Bath Recycling Centre, and the iron bridge was replaced by a new bridge in 2016.