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Did you work with Boardman Coal-Fired Station, Trojan Nuclear Generating Station (Historic), Colstrip Participation, Willamette-Basin Hydroelectric Stations, and Portland-Area Substations? According to publicly filed asbestos litigation records, it allegedly contained asbestos. Here is what it was, who was exposed, and who is responsible. Boardman Coal-Fired Station, Trojan Nuclear Generating Station (Historic), Colstrip Participation, Willamette-Basin Hydroelectric Stations, and Portland-Area Substations, made by Portland General Electric, sold from 1889 until 1985. Plaintiffs allegedly developed mesothelioma and asbestos-related disease after working at Portland General Electric coal-fired, nuclear, and hydroelectric generating stations and Portland-area substations where asbestos pipe covering, block insulation, gaskets, packing, and refractory were routinely disturbed during maintenance, outage, and decommissioning work. According to publicly filed asbestos litigation records, this product allegedly contained the following: pREMISES PATHWAY - asbestos pipe covering on high-pressure steam headers, superheater and reheater piping, feedwater lines, and turbine casings at Boardman (Boardman OR) and Trojan Nuclear (Rainier OR); asbestos block and blanket insulation on boiler walls, economizers, reactor auxiliary piping, and steam-line whip restraints; asbestos-containing gaskets and packing in valves, pumps, and condenser waterboxes; asbestos millboard and transite in switchgear rooms and transformer firewalls at PGE Portland-metro substations; refractory brick in Boardman combustion zones; asbestos-cement panels in secondary containment and cable trays at Trojan — disturbed during outage tear-out, retube work, refueling outages, gasket replacement, decommissioning activities, and insulator lagging repair by pipefitters, boilermakers, insulators, electricians, and millwrights. Workers allegedly exposed around this product included Insulators, Pipefitters, Boilermakers, and Electricians. Asbestos claims are brought against the companies that made the products. If you worked with or around Boardman Coal-Fired Station, Trojan Nuclear Generating Station (Historic), Colstrip Participation, Willamette-Basin Hydroelectric Stations, and Portland-Area Substations and were later diagnosed with mesothelioma, asbestosis, or another asbestos-related disease, you may have a legal claim against the manufacturer. This is educational information from an independent publisher — not a law firm — and is not legal advice.
Premises Description
Portland General Electric Company (PGE), organized in the 1880s and today the largest investor-owned electric utility in Oregon, historically operated the Boardman coal-fired generating station (Boardman OR, retired 2020), the Trojan Nuclear Generating Station (Rainier OR, operated 1976-1992 and later decommissioned), a Willamette-basin hydroelectric fleet (Round Butte, Pelton, Faraday, Sullivan, Bull Run, and other stations), a participating share in the Colstrip coal plant in Montana, and an extensive substation and distribution network across the Portland metropolitan area and northwest Oregon.
Plaintiffs alleged in publicly filed U.S. asbestos personal-injury and wrongful-death litigation that pre-1985 PGE generating stations contained asbestos-containing thermal insulation on boiler headers, superheater and reheater piping, feedwater lines, turbine casings, and reactor-auxiliary steam piping; asbestos-containing gaskets and packing in valves, pumps, and condenser waterboxes; asbestos millboard and transite panels in switchgear rooms and transformer vaults across PGE Portland-metro substations; refractory brick in Boardman combustion chambers; and asbestos-cement panels in Trojan secondary containment and cable-tray systems. Plaintiffs allegedly encountered airborne asbestos during scheduled outages, refueling outages, gasket replacements, retubes, Trojan decommissioning, and insulation tear-out and re-lagging.
Workers Exposed
Plaintiffs alleged that station operators, boiler mechanics, pipefitters, insulators, electricians, millwrights, and decommissioning workers at PGE plants and substations from approximately 1940 through the mid-1980s (and Trojan decommissioning through the 1990s and 2000s) were exposed to respirable asbestos fibers when boiler lagging was cut, gaskets were scraped from flange faces, valve packing was repacked, refractory brick was chipped, and asbestos-containing components were removed during decommissioning.