N.Z. ‘Greatly Dependent’ On Coal Industry
(From Our Own Reporter)
TIMARU, March 11.
The coal industry was an important part of the country’s energy requirements. It would become more so, and the Government was going to become aware that it was greatly dependent on the coal industry, the director of the Coal Advisory Service Association (Mr P. A. Toynbee) told 25 delegates at the annual conference of the South Island Coal Merchants’ Federation held today at Fraser Park.
Mr Toynbee, who has had considerable experience in the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research as a member of the Institute of Fuel, said that coal was supplying 60 per cent of the country’s requirements of heating energy.
Mr Toynbee said New Zealand was “running out” of hydro-electric sites which could be economically developed. The country was getting “embarrassed” finding the money to satisfy the “insatiable” demands for electricity. For every extra kilowatt of load applied to the generation and transmission system, £250 had to be found. £5OO For Heater
“A standard electric heater costs £2O but it costs the Government and local bodies about £5OO in capital to meet the load which is placed on the system,” said Mr Toynbee.
“The New Zealand Electricity Department is concerned about that,” he said.
The coal industry was expanding, he added. The factors which indicated that household coal would remain for a long time were the problems of cost of electricity, and the image of coal depended on household consumption. Mr Toynbee said that recently, in Victoria (Australia) outstanding developments had taken place in the consumption of domestic briquettes. In seven years, domestic sales of briquettes had been quadrupled—“and this in the face of cheap electricity and two recently established oil refineries,” Mr Toynbee added.
Right Appliances Needed
He said it was important to get the right domestic appliances installed and accepted by the public. There would be a tendency in the future to use smaller coal distributed in 561 b paper bags, said Mr Toynbee. As director of C.A.S.A., he was concentrating on three important functions. These were: to bring a better appreciation of the importance of coal to the national economy; to produce a better image of coal (in this respect, the installation of demonstration plants was improving the image), and to concentrate on
getting improved domestic appliances. “The coal industry must show the Government that it has energy, and faith in the future,” Mr Toynbee said. Mr Toynbee said it was obvious that oil could not replace the coal industry. If the consumption of fuel oil continued to rise as at present, within a few years the cost of importing it would equal the Dominion’s butter cheque, he said.
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Press, Volume CV, Issue 31007, 12 March 1966, Page 1
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448N.Z. ‘Greatly Dependent’ On Coal Industry Press, Volume CV, Issue 31007, 12 March 1966, Page 1
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