DFC interested in giving new power to old power plant: This is what Tesla Museum could look like

Instead of the bricks showing up underneath the facade that has been peeling off for a long time, broken glass and a rusty crane, the building will be bright, white and paired down

The proposal for the new look of the Nikola Tesla Museum in the area of ​​the abandoned thermal power plant known as "Power and Light" on the Dorcol bank of the Danube River, was presented exclusively less than two years ago in Belgrade, the Kaldrma BGD page has learned.

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"It was proposed by a US investment fund, with the intention of creating a museum that, due to the importance and global popularity of Nikola Tesla, would attract a large number of visitors not only from Serbia but also from the US, EU and other countries. According to what our page has learned, there is high possibility of this project becoming one of the first to be realized through the newly opened office of the US DFC (International Development Finance Corporation) in Belgrade, due to the importance of Nikola Tesla both for Serbians and Americans, as a symbol of connection between the two countries," a post said.

The announcement is accompanied by a photograph of what the old, monumental facility of the thermal power plant will look like in a new light. Instead of the bricks showing up underneath the facade that has been peeling off for a long time, broken glass and a rusty crane, the building will be bright, white, paired down, and imposing despite its simplicity.

Why this building is so important

Few people take a walk all the way to the very end of the Danube Quay on Dorcol, to the marina, from where you can see the dark building of the old thermal power plant. But, the fact that for many this is now merely the end of a promenade, might become the beginning in the future - the first point on the stretch from Dorcol to Savamala which will be crowded with tourists in the line park, a place recalling of the beginning of electrification and industrialization of the pre-war Belgrade. And of course, of Nikola Tesla, whose invention illuminated not only Belgrade, but the whole world.

The thermal plant was built between 1930 to 1932 as a modern building, with plenty of glass and steel, but without unnecessary decorations, with the goal of best serving its purpose - the "magical" process of converting heat into electricity and rendering its generators the engine of the entire city.

This was truly the beginning. Craftsmen would get up before dawn, light their bulbs and prepare their machines, bankers and entrepreneurs would sit in their comfortable armchairs in beautifully lit salons, while students would read their books under a small light at a table in the National Library. Dawn would muffle the glow of the Terazije candelabras, as the first trams took people to work, students to school, vendors to their stalls...

And that was really the magic - the whole of Belgrade was supplied with electricity that came from that very building, and for the first time, it was alternating current that went through the lines - the invention of Nikola Tesla, that kickstarted the world.

Direct current that was used until then could have never powered a mass of machines, illuminated an entire city, be in every apartments or power all trams in one city. With direct current, power plants would have never moved out of the cities, instead their chimneys would  continue to "adorn" New York, Paris, London...

The "magic" of electricity still impresses today, especially when Tesla, who traveled into the future with his imposing experiments, is mentioned - without him, we would have waited for generations for this discovery that kickstarted the world.

(Telegraf.rs)