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Chronological List of District Heating
Systems in the United States |
The district steam heating system in Cedar Rapids began service on October 10, 1892. Most of the system was abandoned after severe flooding in 2009, with two customers taking high pressure steam keeping their service early 2026.
References
1937 Bulletin of the National District Heating Association 22:129
(April 1937)
The Iowa Electric Light & Power Company operates a district steam
heating system in Cedar Rapids, Iowa -- a city of 60,000 population.
The original plant was placed in service October 10, 1892 and has been
continuously operated and is now serving some 300 commercial and
residential customers.
Approximately 98% of the business district uses steam for building and hot
water heating, pressures ranging from 1 to 3 lbs. with a few exceptions
where 100 pounds in required for steam presses, cooking, etc. 207
pounds pressure is supplied to the Quaker Oats largest cereal mill,
serving their entire steam needs.
Steam distribution system pipes sizes vary from 20 to 6 inches extending a
distance of 8 miles.
This company also operates steam heating systems in Perry, Boone, Vinton,
Grundy, Spirit Lake and Marion, Iowa
1950 "The
heat is on: C.R.'s system is one of the largest," The
Gazette, January 1, 1950.
THE HEAT IS ON in Cedar Rapids.
It snakes out underground through 10 long miles of pipe, and it’s
something to get steamed up about.
For Cedar Rapids’ heating system of hot water vapor is said to be
one of the largest, per person of population, in the country.
It is far and away the biggest city steam layout in Iowa, Engineer Dean
Barnhizer of the Iowa Electric Light and Power Company disclosed last
week.
More than 500 users tap this source of 220-degree warmth for a total bill
that tops a quarter-million dollars yearly. Primarily, they use it for
heating stores and offices.
But they also pipe it in for things like mixing concrete in the winter.
And city steam helps keep Cedar Rapids shiny behind the ears by cutting
out the downtown soot and smokestack nuisance that plagues so many places.
Nine out of every 16 business buildings in the loop keep warm with steam
from city mains, Barnhizer related.
Eating places and hotels bring it in to pressure-cook the food they serve.
Bakeries use it in “proofbox” operations – raising dough for bread in a
warm, humid atmosphere. Laundries and dry-cleaning places press clothing
with the stuff.
For water-warming, too, steam is often the agent that brings it to a boil.
Coiled tubing enters steam-filled chests that heat the water flowing
through.
Then there is year-round air conditioning, Barnhizer added.
Many firms have junked their normal radiators and put in units that blow
hot air in winter just as they cool it during the summer.
Steam is the source of warmth.
One construction material firm uses hot water vapor to mix cement when the
weather gets cold.
And at Quaker Oats they don’t just heat the huge plant with steam. They
also put it to work in processing furfural, in cooking grains, in drying
and sterilization jobs.
Some of these things go on all year, of course. But mainly the business is
one of keeping people warm.
Go to the city hall in Cedar Rapids and it’s city steam that chases the
chill. The Chamber of Commerce, Linn county courthouse and post
office-federal building all use it too.
So do the big loop department stores, banks, theaters, many hotels, all
but two large office structures. Coe college heats its halls of
learning with steam. Ditto St. Luke’s and Mercy hospitals.
Even residential dwellings and apartments get in on the 10-mile network,
Barnhizer pointed out. A block-wide strip between A and B avenues out to
Coe is one steam heating housing region. Another runs between First and
Second avenues SE from Tenth street to the Commonwealth apartments.
Steam-heating bills are roughly comparable to those from other fuel,
Barnhizer added. But everything is limited to Cedar Rapids’ east side. The
farthest-west pipeline is one that feeds Municipal Island structures. All
this, incidentally, has been expanding since 1892. That was the year
when two local users both hooked onto the first city steam line.
One was a railroad office of the Burlington, Cedar Rapids and Northern –
forerunner of the Rock Island. The W. D. Douglas residence also got
steam
heat 56 years ago at Fifth street and First avenue, site of the present
Y.M.C.A. building.
At first, Barnhizer explained, heating-steam came from old reciprocating
engines such as most locomotives still employ. Escaping vapor went to
waste until someone thought of a way to use it for more than spinning the
generators of electric current.
Today, steam for heating comes from powerful turbines that also brew
electric juice, the engineer went on. Pipelines “bleed” the turbines as
vapor swirls through. If necessary to keep up pressure, steam can also be
tapped before it hits a turbine.
Originally, it comes from water drawn out of the river and purified at
Cedar Rapids’ municipal plant. Then the liquid gets special treatment for
boiler use — some 60 million gallons in all each year.
This boiler-to–turbine-to-pipeline route carries steam from the plant at a
pressure of 15 to 100 pounds per square inch. It flows through miles and
miles of pipe, makes a back alley entrance to most buildings, then ends as
a rule in radiators.
On its way, though, manholes dot the underground course—low spots where
condensed water drains off into sewers.
When it finally reaches a useful point, Barnhizer explained, steam is
pushing with a one to two pounds per square inch pressure.
Cooling off, it condenses back into water. The liquid trickles into a
basement tank.
And thus it sloshes also through a steam meter, measured at last to set
the user’s heating bill. That’s the system everywhere except at Quaker
Oats, where they meter the live-steam flow before it does anything.
Finally, after it gets through a meter, the petered-out steam goes down a
city sewer pipe. Its user pays the regular sewage disposal fee.
In all, some 500 million pounds of steam go down the drain in a single
year. That’s 500 million pounds of water before it hit the boiling point.
And it’s also the heat equivalent of 42,000 tons of coal, Barnhizer
pointed out. You could get that much in 764 railroad coal cars – in a
freight train six miles long.
Besides, there would be about 4,200 tons of ashes left to haul away, not
to mention measureless billows of smoke that could but don’t get a chance
to stifle the business district.
Ashes which do remain from boiler firing at the power plant all go into
the Cedar slough.
Behind the sprawling city steam setup, Barnhizer said, is a raft of paper
work which brings out how much heat is needed and when. Keeping detailed
temperature records and basing their guesses on the normal change-pattern,
engineers can safely say:
December, January and February each will take about 20 percent
of a year’s total heat supply. November and March need 12 and 14 percent
respectively. April seven, October six and May about three percent
too. The rest get free heat from the sun.
But even in the summertime, Barnhizer added, city steam can lend a hand to
one of its leading rivals in the water vapor field—the steam locomotive.
Every so often an engine must enter a roundhouse, have its fire
put out, its ashes removed, its water drained off, be cleaned and cooled.
Then when the time comes to move once more, building up a new head of
steam would mean a lengthy wait.
So they load the boiler with city steam and build a fire to carry on
from there. In a matter of minutes, the engine pulls out.
During cold weather too when Pullman cars stand idle in yards before
they join a train, it’s city steam that keeps them warm.
Meanwhile, as it does right now, the bulk of Cedar Rapids’ business loop
stays piping hot – 10 miles’ worth.
2009 "Downtown
Cedar Rapids out of steam," The Gazette, December 1. 2009
A long tradition has ended in Cedar Rapids. For more than a century, a
giant steam system heated much of the downtown area. Tuesday, Alliant
Energy shut it down.
Steam had come out of this plant for the last 117 years, and except for
the flood, Alliant Energy says the system had never gone all of the way
down.
The flood severely damaged the plant where Alliant made the steam, and in
order to provide the heat, it brought in temporary boilers at a
significantly higher cost to operate.
For a majority of customers, that meant switching heat sources in
buildings.
Despite the change, Alliant will still operate its high pressure system
for a few major companies.
Among them is Quaker Oats, which will use the system until next Spring.
It's not just the steam system that was historic, the plant itself was
too.
Alliant's Scott Drzycimski said, "The plant was the first alternating
current plant on the west side of the Mississippi, and it was one of three
others when it opened across the country providing alternative current."
Other plants were providing direct current, which is now primarily used in
batteries.
Earlier this year businesses that were on the system applied to the
Federal Government for help in paying for the switch over to a different
system.
They have yet to hear back.
2025 SEC
Form 10-K, for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2025
Page 4: Subsequent to December 31, 2025, IPL exited the steam
business.
© 2026 Morris A. Pierce