About Burger Plant | Shadyside, OH
Facility Location and Operations
The R.E. Burger Plant — formally the Robert E. Burger Generating Station — was a coal-fired electricity generating station in Shadyside, Ohio, Belmont County, on the Ohio River. The plant supplied electrical power to a large portion of Ohio and surrounding states for several decades.
Burger Plant was owned and operated by:
- Ohio Edison Company (original operator)
- FirstEnergy Generation Corp (later operator; part of FirstEnergy, one of the largest electric utilities in the United States)
Timeline of Operations
- Mid-20th century: Commercial operations began
- 1950s–1990s: Peak operational years; asbestos-containing materials were reportedly used throughout the plant during this period
- 2000s–present: Transition to decommissioning and NESHAP-regulated asbestos abatement
Industrial Context: The Mississippi River Industrial Corridor & Ohio asbestos Exposure
Burger Plant sits in the upper Ohio River Valley, but its story is inseparable from the broader industrial history of the Mississippi and Ohio River basin — a connected region where workers, materials, and construction crews routinely moved between facilities in Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois. Coal-fired power plants and heavy industrial facilities throughout the Mississippi River industrial corridor relied on the same asbestos-containing materials, the same manufacturers, and often the same union labor pools throughout the 20th century.
For Ohio residents who worked at Burger Plant, this regional industrial connection means your exposure history may be relevant to lawsuits filed in Ohio courts. An asbestos cancer lawyer Cleveland can evaluate your claim under Ohio law while coordinating against defendants and trust funds that appear repeatedly in similar cases across the industrial corridor.
Missouri and Illinois facilities operating in the same industrial tradition as Burger included:
- Labadie Energy Center (Franklin County, MO) — Ameren UE’s largest coal plant, where workers may have been exposed to asbestos-containing materials in the same product categories reportedly documented at Burger
- Portage des Sioux Power Plant (St. Charles County, MO) — situated directly on the Mississippi River north of St. Louis, with reported asbestos-containing insulation use consistent with Ohio Valley facilities
- Sioux Energy Center (St. Charles County, MO) — Ameren UE facility with documented NESHAP abatement activity
- Rush Island Energy Center (Jefferson County, MO) — Jefferson County facility south of St. Louis with similar construction-era asbestos-containing material use patterns
- Granite City Steel (Granite City, IL) — Madison County, Illinois facility where steelworkers and pipefitters may have been exposed to asbestos-containing materials during the same decades
- Monsanto Chemical / Solutia facilities (St. Louis, MO) — chemical manufacturing operations where insulators and maintenance trades reportedly encountered asbestos-containing pipe insulation and equipment coatings
Workers who traveled the corridor — taking outage work at Burger and then returning to Ohio or Illinois home jurisdictions — carried exposure histories relevant to legal claims in multiple states. An asbestos attorney ohio licensed in your home state can file claims in the courts where you have residency and work history.
If you are a Ohio resident with a work history at Burger Plant and a diagnosis of mesothelioma or asbestosis, you may have viable claims in Ohio courts right now.
Construction and Early Operations (1940s–1960s)
Asbestos-containing materials were reportedly installed throughout Burger Plant during original construction and subsequent expansion, with no meaningful worker protections in place. This period marked the peak of asbestos use in American industrial construction.
Exposure-generating activities during this phase allegedly included:
- Installing asbestos-containing pipe insulation blocks — including products such as calcium silicate pipe insulation, Thermobestos, and pipe insulation — on steam piping throughout the plant
- Hand-mixing and applying asbestos-containing insulating cement in poorly ventilated enclosed spaces
- Cutting, rasping, and fitting asbestos-containing insulation with hand and power tools, generating high airborne fiber concentrations
Insulators affiliated with Heat and Frost Insulators Local 1 (St. Louis) or Heat and Frost Insulators Local 27 (Kansas City), and pipefitters affiliated with Plumbers and Pipefitters UA Local 562 (St. Louis) or Plumbers and Pipefitters UA Local 268 (Kansas City), working at Burger during this era — whether on construction crews dispatched from Missouri or during outage work — may have sustained some of the heaviest lifetime asbestos exposures documented among American industrial workers.
The same union locals that dispatched members to Missouri’s power plants at Labadie and Portage des Sioux also dispatched members to Ohio Valley facilities, creating shared exposure histories that span state lines and that an experienced asbestos attorney ohio can use to build your case.
Peak Operations and Maintenance (1960s–1980s)
Asbestos exposure risks reportedly continued through routine and emergency maintenance during Burger’s peak operational decades:
- Gasket replacement at flanged pipe connections
- Valve repacking with asbestos-containing packing materials
- Insulated pipe repairs requiring workers to disturb existing insulation
- Deteriorated asbestos-containing insulation releasing fibers as a matter of routine
- Annual boiler outage work on systems allegedly insulated with products including spray-applied fireproofing, high-temperature pipe insulation, and similar compounds
- Maintenance and replacement of asbestos-containing gaskets manufactured by gaskets and packing
Workers disturbing asbestos-containing materials during this period may have encountered airborne fiber concentrations far exceeding levels now understood to cause mesothelioma and other asbestos-related disease.
Ohio workers who traveled to Burger for outage and maintenance work during these decades, then returned home to the St. Louis metro area or Kansas City, carried those exposure histories with them. Those exposure histories form the evidentiary foundation for Asbestos Ohio claims filed today. Ohio’s 2-year statute of limitations runs from your diagnosis date — but **
Regulatory Response (1970s–1990s)
- OSHA began setting and progressively tightening permissible asbestos exposure limits through the 1970s
- EPA implemented
Generating Unit Equipment — Public Registry
The following generating units are documented in the North American Electric Generating Plants database for this facility. This database is maintained by UDI/S&P Global and draws on federal EIA filings and state regulatory records.
| Unit | Year | Capacity | Fuel | Boiler Type | Boiler/Steam Sys Mfr | Turbine Mfr | Generator Mfr | Steam Params | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Re Burger 1 | 1944 | 57.5 MW | Coal | Front | Bw | Ge | Ge | 820 PSI / 850°F | Retired 1995 |
| Re Burger 2 | 1947 | 57.5 MW | Coal | Front | Bw | Ge | Ge | 820 PSI / 850°F | Retired 1995 |
| Re Burger 3 | 1950 | 103.5 MW | Coal | Front | Bw | Wh | Wh | 820 PSI / 950°F | Operating |
| Re Burger 4 | 1955 | 156.3 MW | Coal | Front | Bw | Wh | Wh | 2000 PSI / 1050°F | Operating |
| Re Burger 5 | 1955 | 156.3 MW | Coal | Front | Bw | Wh | Wh | 2000 PSI / 1050°F | Operating |
| Re Burger Ic 1A | 1972 | 2.5 MW | Oil | N/A | N/A | Operating | |||
| Re Burger Ic 1B | 1972 | 2.5 MW | Oil | N/A | N/A | Operating | |||
| Re Burger Ic 2B | 1972 | 2.5 MW | Oil | N/A | N/A | Operating |
Source: UDI/S&P Global North American Electric Generating Plants database (NAMERICA 2025). Public reference data.
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General Equipment at Burger Plant | Shadyside, OH
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.
Documented Asbestos Evidence
The records below are verified, state-documented asbestos removals at this facility. Each entry represents a regulated abatement project where the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (Ohio EPA) 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 Ohio EPA 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:
Critical Filing Deadline & Next Steps
Ohio law gives mesothelioma and asbestos-disease claimants 2 years from the date of medical diagnosis to file a personal-injury lawsuit (ORC § 2305.10). For wrongful-death claims after an asbestos-related death, the filing window is 2 years from the date of death (ORC § 2125.02). 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
- 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.
- Preserve medical records. Pathology reports, biopsy results, imaging, and pulmonary-function tests are central to both civil claims and trust-fund filings.
- 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.
- Speak with an asbestos attorney with Ohio 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.
Data Sources
Information about facility equipment, industrial materials, and occupational records referenced on this page is drawn from publicly available sources where applicable, including:
- EPA ECHO Facility Compliance Database — enforcement and compliance records for industrial facilities
- OSHA Establishment Search — federal workplace inspection history
- EIA Form 860 Plant Data — power-plant equipment and ownership records (where applicable)
- Ohio Environmental Protection Agency NESHAP asbestos abatement notification records
- Published asbestos trial and trust fund records (publicly filed court documents)
- AsbestosIndex Product & Manufacturer Crosswalk — historical asbestos-containing product schedules linked to manufacturers
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.