About Robert Reid Power Plant

Coal-fired power generation created the perfect storm for asbestos exposure: aging industrial infrastructure, constant maintenance demands, and widespread use of asbestos-containing insulation, gaskets, and fireproofing materials that manufacturers knew were hazardous long before plant operators took any protective action.

Workers at facilities like Robert Reid may have been exposed to asbestos fibers released during application, maintenance, repair, and removal of asbestos-containing materials. Insulators, boilermakers, pipefitters, and laborers may have encountered fiber concentrations now understood to cause mesothelioma, lung cancer, and other asbestos-related diseases — sometimes from relatively limited cumulative exposure over a career.

General Equipment at Robert Reid Power Plant

The equipment below represents the systems and infrastructure documented or typically present at this facility during the era when asbestos-containing materials were specified in industrial construction. This is general facility-equipment reference — not a legal attribution of any specific product, manufacturer, or exposure event to this facility. Material-category and manufacturer information is addressed in the AsbestosIndex Product Crosswalk linked under the records table below.

Boilers View crosswalk › Steam Turbines View crosswalk › Steam Traps View crosswalk › Condensers View crosswalk › Feedwater Heaters View crosswalk › Cooling Towers View crosswalk › Pipe Insulation View crosswalk › Block Insulation View crosswalk › Refractory Lining View crosswalk › Valves View crosswalk › Gaskets View crosswalk › Pumps View crosswalk ›

Documented Asbestos Evidence

The records below are verified, state-documented asbestos removals at this facility. Each entry represents a regulated abatement project where the Kentucky Department for Environmental Protection (Kentucky DEP) was notified under federal NESHAP rules, the work was logged, and the asbestos-containing material was confirmed and removed under regulated conditions. These are not allegations or estimates — they are paper records tying documented asbestos-containing material to this specific site.

No Kentucky DEP NESHAP abatement notifications have been identified for this facility in current public records. Per the framing above, absence of state-agency documentation should not be read as absence of asbestos — only as absence of a formal, regulated abatement event meeting reporting thresholds. Workers who recall encountering pipe insulation, block insulation, gaskets, or other asbestos-era construction materials at this facility may still have viable claims regardless of whether a state record exists.

Material Categories in Documented Records

The materials documented above (and similar asbestos-containing materials commonly encountered in records of this type) appear in the AsbestosIndex catalog with historical manufacturer and trust-fund information. Click a category to view manufacturers historically associated with that material:

Thermal System Insulation View crosswalk › Asbestos-Cement Board View crosswalk › Pipe Insulation View crosswalk › Roofing & Flashing View crosswalk › Spray Fireproofing View crosswalk › Floor Tile & Mastic View crosswalk › Ceiling Tile View crosswalk › Gaskets & Packing View crosswalk ›

Who May Have Been Exposed at Robert Reid Power Plant

Insulators faced the highest asbestos exposure risk at facilities like Robert Reid. Their core work — applying, maintaining, and removing thermal insulation on boiler systems, steam lines, and turbine casings — required direct, hands-on contact with asbestos-containing insulation products on a daily basis. Common tasks included mixing and applying asbestos-containing insulating cement, cutting and fitting asbestos-containing block insulation to pipe configurations, removing old deteriorated insulation, and working in poorly ventilated boiler rooms and pipe tunnels where fibers accumulated over time. Members of Heat and Frost Insulators Local 1 (St. Louis) and similar regional locals who traveled throughout the Mississippi River industrial corridor — including plants in Missouri and across the river in Illinois — may have accumulated exposures at multiple sites over the course of a career.

Boilermakers maintained, repaired, and overhauled the pressure vessels and steam systems at the core of coal-fired power generation. Their work allegedly brought them into repeated contact with asbestos-containing materials through removing and replacing insulation on boiler drums, headers, and steam lines, working inside boiler fireboxes and gas passes reportedly lined with asbestos-containing refractory and insulating cement, cutting and handling asbestos-containing gaskets for boiler manway covers and hand holes, and performing outage work alongside insulators in confined, poorly ventilated spaces. Members of Boilermakers Local 27 (St. Louis) who worked at Missouri facilities may have carried forward exposure histories relevant to claims involving other facilities in the region.

Pipefitters and steamfitters maintained the steam, feedwater, and drain systems containing hundreds of flanged connections, valves, and pumps. Their alleged exposures included cutting, punching, and installing asbestos-containing gaskets at virtually every flanged joint in the steam system, removing packing material from valve stems and pump shafts, breaking apart pipe insulation to access flanges, and handling insulation debris generated by other trades. Members of UA Local 562 (St. Louis) who worked across the Missouri-Illinois industrial corridor frequently accumulated asbestos exposure across multiple facilities throughout their careers. Millwrights and machinists may have been exposed through removing gaskets and insulation from turbine casing joints, handling asbestos-containing packing from turbine shaft seals, and working in turbine halls where insulation removal generated dangerous airborne fiber. Electricians and instrument technicians may have been exposed through working with asbestos-containing wire insulation, cutting and drilling transite board used in control panels and electrical enclosures, and maintaining switchgear reportedly containing asbestos-containing arc chutes. Operating engineers and plant operators may have been exposed through routine presence in areas where maintenance activities disturbed asbestos-containing materials and daily contact with asbestos-containing building materials. Laborers who swept, cleaned, and performed general plant maintenance may have been exposed through disturbing settled asbestos-containing dust through dry sweeping, shoveling, and cleanup of insulation debris.

Critical Filing Deadline & Next Steps

Kentucky law gives mesothelioma and asbestos-disease claimants 1 year from the date of medical diagnosis to file a personal-injury lawsuit (KRS § 413.140). For wrongful-death claims after an asbestos-related death, the filing window is 1 year from the date of death (KRS § 413.180). The two deadlines run on separate tracks — preserving one does not extend the other.

The personal-injury clock runs from diagnosis, not from exposure. Mesothelioma latency is typically 20 to 50 years, so workers exposed in the 1950s–1980s are being diagnosed today.

Practical first steps

  1. Document what you remember. Pay stubs, W-2s, union cards, photographs, coworker names, and dates of employment. The WorkChain widget on this page can save a copy you can email yourself.
  2. Preserve medical records. Pathology reports, biopsy results, imaging, and pulmonary-function tests are central to both civil claims and trust-fund filings.
  3. Identify household members. Spouses who laundered work clothing and children of plant workers are eligible for secondary-exposure claims when diagnosed with an asbestos-related disease.
  4. Speak with an asbestos attorney with Kentucky experience. The first conversation is free and confidential. Asbestos trust-fund claims and civil claims run on different tracks — both can be pursued in parallel.

Asbestos-Related Diseases

Asbestos fiber exposure can cause several specific diseases that typically appear decades after the original exposure. The latency period — the gap between exposure and diagnosis — usually runs 20 to 50 years. That's why workers exposed in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s are receiving diagnoses today.

Mesothelioma

A rare, aggressive cancer that affects the lining of the lungs (pleural mesothelioma), abdomen (peritoneal), or heart (pericardial). Mesothelioma is almost exclusively caused by asbestos exposure, which is why a mesothelioma diagnosis often points directly to historical workplace exposure. Average latency from first exposure to diagnosis is 30-50 years.

Asbestosis

A chronic, non-cancerous scarring of lung tissue caused by inhaled asbestos fibers. Asbestosis causes progressive shortness of breath, persistent cough, and reduced lung function. It does not improve with treatment, and it is a recognized basis for compensation under most trust schedules and civil claims.

Lung Cancer

Asbestos exposure significantly increases the risk of lung cancer, particularly when combined with a history of smoking. Asbestos-related lung cancer is compensable under the same trust schedules and civil claim avenues as mesothelioma.

Other Recognized Diseases

Pleural plaques, pleural thickening, laryngeal cancer, ovarian cancer, and certain gastrointestinal cancers are also recognized as asbestos-related under various trust schedules and case-law authorities, though eligibility and proof requirements vary by claim type.

If you have any of these diagnoses and you worked at this facility, lived with someone who did, or were exposed in any documented capacity, you may have a claim worth pursuing. Speak with an attorney before assuming you don't qualify.

Cross-State & Regional Corridor Workers

Workers dispatched from Missouri union locals including Heat and Frost Insulators Local 1, UA Local 562, and Boilermakers Local 27 — as well as their counterparts in Illinois locals — traveled throughout the Mississippi River industrial corridor during their careers, working at facilities in Missouri, southern Illinois, and Kentucky. That regional work pattern means exposure histories for many workers span multiple states and multiple facilities.

Power plant outages bring large numbers of contract workers into a facility for concentrated maintenance periods. Contract workers — insulators, boilermakers, pipefitters, and laborers dispatched from regional union halls — may have worked at Robert Reid during one or more outages and may have been exposed to asbestos-containing materials without receiving adequate information about the hazards present. Facilities in the Missouri-Illinois corridor where comparable exposures are alleged include the Labadie Energy Center (Franklin County, Missouri), Portage des Sioux Power Plant (St. Charles County, Missouri), Monsanto chemical facilities in St. Louis County, and Granite City Steel in Madison County, Illinois.

Data Sources

Information about facility equipment, industrial materials, and occupational records referenced on this page is drawn from publicly available sources where applicable, including:

If specific equipment or product claims in this article are sourced from a non-public database, the source is identified parenthetically within the text above.