Granton Gas Works

This town gas holder has dominated the northern skyline of Edinburgh for over a century. Its future is undecided with the owners, The National Grid, wanting to overturn the listed building status on economic grounds.

Granton Gas Works was Scotland's largest gas producer when designed and built between 1898 -1902 by the architect engineer Walter Ralph Herring for the Edinburgh & Leith Gas Commissioners Company.

The gas works ceased to be used for production in 1987, when North Sea gas came on line, and and storage in 2001. Since then the majority of the site has been developed, erasing most of the industrial past, as offices, a college, housing, and a supermarket. Only the gas holder, the site gatehouse and works railway station now remain of the original works.

The steel framed gas holder holds a rising and falling bell of four sections. It is 157ft high with a diameter of 252ft, with 24 vertical posts and scissor bracing, described in the Buildings of Scotland as of "extraordinary delicacy". The vertical posts were originally crowned by thistle finials which emitted gas flames, which must of been impressive.