ScottishPower has announced plans to dismantle Kincardine Power Station in Fife, a major provider of Scotland's energy in the late '60s and 70s, because of increasing maintenance costs.

Kincardine last generated around 10 years ago and its subsequent role to provide strategic reserve came to an end in '97.

The station's last two main generating units are still in place but are beyond economic repair and parts of the station fabric are deteriorating. The buildings are presently being used for storage of equipment and for training purposes.

The 55-hectare site, which will take around 18 months to level, is being retained by the company for future generation purposes. The 132,000-volt substation on the site and the station's rail network will remain in operation.

ScottishPower's Technology business will manage the project and assurances have been given that inconvenience will be kept to the minimum. Most of the scrap material will be transported off-site by rail to minimise road traffic. The major routes for the contractors' vehicles will avoid Kincardine village.

The local community council are being kept fully informed and will be consulted at all stages of the work, which is due to begin over the next month or so.

Eric Golland, Managing Director of ScottishPower's Generation business, who was formerly Kincardine Station Engineer, said: "It's obviously not practicable for us to restore the station to working order, but it will still be sad to see Kincardine disappear. Many of our staff worked there and the station was a landmark on the Forth shoreline. It also pioneered much of the thermally-efficient engineering adopted at our Cockenzie and Longannet Power Stations."

Note: Kincardine was built by the former British Electricity Authority on land reclaimed from the Forth during the previous century. In turn, the nearby Longannet Power Station, opened in '73, occupies foreshore created from Kincardine's pulverised fuel ash, a by-product of coal-burning.

The station began generating in 1958 and was formally opened by the Queen on 12 October, 1960.

Kincardine's lifetime output of 51,300 Gigawatthours is roughly equivalent to Scotland's total energy consumption over a two-year period. The station had five generating units and an installed capacity of 760 Megawatts.

It was fuelled by small coal, called "slack", supplied by the coalfields in Fife and Central Scotland and burned up to 2.5 million tonnes a year.

In 1965 and 1966 Kincardine won the accolade of the UK's most efficient power station.