VIDEO: First building on London 2012 Olympic Park completed

Located in Kings Yard in the west of the Olympic Park it will distribute electricity across the Olympic Park and Stratford City site through a new electrical networks consisting of more than 100 km of cabling. It is designed, constructed, owned and operated by EDF Energy through its wholly owned subsidiary Lea Valley Utilities (LVU).

Construction started in December 2007 and is now complete, making the substation the first building to reach this stage on the Olympic Park. It will start supplying electricity to the Stratford City site next month (November), with the Olympic Stadium set to be the first Olympic venue to receive electricity early next year.

The substation was officially switched on by EDF Energy Networks managing director Laurent Ferrari and ODA director of infrastructure and utilities Simon Wright.

The completion of work on the substation follows the good progress being made on the wider utilities networks and infrastructure being built across the Olympic Park site.

The Electrical Substation takes power from the upstream 132000 volt electrical network outside the Olympic Park site. Main transformers within the substation then ‘step-down' the power to 11000 volts so that it can be distributed and used by venues and buildings across the Park and in the Stratford City development.

Emphasis was put on the architectural designs of the substation to ensure it fitted in with the design of the wider Olympic Park. It was designed by EDF Energy with specialist support from Andrews Associates for the structural design elements and NORD Architecture (a Glasgow-based practice that won the prestigious Young Architect of the Year Award in 2006) for the external architectural features.

The external architecture was designed as a dark brick building to create a sense of solidity appropriate to the building's role as a key part of the Olympic Park's utilities infrastructure. The use of dark brick also reflects the traditional use of dark brick stock as window and corner details on the former Kings Yard industrial buildings on the site where the new substation has been built.

Sustainability is at the heart of the plans and the construction of the substation reused crushed materials from the demolition of the former Kings Yard buildings. It also includes a ‘brown roof' which involves crushed materials laid down on a flat roof that will help enhance the ecological value and biodiversity of the site by attracting local wildlife, including black redstarts, a rare bird that thrives on brownfield land.

EDF Energy is also working with the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games (LOCOG) to develop a low-carbon fuel solution for the flame of the Olympic Cauldron and Torch and the electricity that EDF Energy supplies to LOCOG during Games-time will come from renewable sources.

Substation Fact file

• More than 130,000 bricks were used in the construction of the substation
• More than 200 piles were installed up to 19 m deep to form the foundations for the building
• The Electricity Substation will house 132/11 kV transformers, each weighing 110 tonnes, as well as 11000 switchgear and auxiliary equipment
• The building is 80 m-long and 14 m-wide. The building height varies - the highest point being 15.9 m at the Western end and lowest point is 4.87 m in the centre of the building
• The substation will distribute electricity across the Olympic Park and Stratford City site through new electrical networks consisting of more than 100 km of electrical cabling - enough to cover 250 laps of the Olympic Stadium track
• The substation's eastern tower was designed to be lower in height to avoid blocking a "viewing corridor" from the north east corner of the Olympic Park to the Olympic Stadium in south-west, as well as