| Long Island Lighting Company | |
| Location: | Hicksville, New York, United States |
| Defunct: | 1998 |
The Long Island Lighting Company, or LILCO ("lil-co"), was an electrical power company and natural gas utility for Long Island, New York, serving 2.7 million people in Nassau, Suffolk and Queens counties,[1] from 1911 until 1998.
It was founded by Ellis Laurimore Phillips, an engineer, and a group of New York City investors, including George W. Olmsted.[2] At the time, Long Island had multiple small power utilities that served individual villages; their business plan was to acquire these and interconnect them into an island-wide grid. In 1911, their first purchases were four small electric companies in Amityville, Islip, Northport and Sayville.[3]
The Glenwood Generating Station was constructed from 1928 to 1931.[4] [5] The extra generating capacity was needed due to a sixfold increase in Long Island's electricity demand from 1910 to 1925. The expansion also reflected LILCO's then-novel philosophy of using few centralized power plants interconnected by transmission lines, rather than many small plants distributed through the region.[6] In 1936 it was described as "the key electric generating plant of the Long Island system,"[7] and its control room managed LILCO's entire system.
LILCO greatly increased its generating facilities to meet increasing power demands created by Long Island's postwar population growth. In the 1950s, two new units were constructed at the Glenwood Generating Station, and two at the new E. F. Barrett Power Station, and one at the new Far Rockaway Power Station. At the time The New York Times called the Glenwood Generating Station "one of the most modern power plants in the country," with both mechanical and electrostatic precipitators for dust and ash collection, as well as valve silencers and noise barriers. It was the first turbine generator mounted on an open deck in the Northeastern United States.[8] Four units were also constructed at the Port Jefferson Power Station between 1948 and 1960.[9] [10] [11] [12]