WATER-POWER AGAIN.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 963, 2 November 1910, Page 6

WATER-POWER AGAIN.

The very grave importance of the question is our reason lor returning to-day to the Aid to Water .rower VtorKs Bill. With the exception of Mr. lu'bowAN, who questioned tho wisdom of nationalising waterpower, and ventured tne opinion tnat tiie' Government should- not be driven into hurried action by "a popular cry," the speakors who continued the debate in the Legislative Council yesterday contributed very little of value to the discussion. The Hon. J. JAigg, for example, appears to welcome the Bill on account of the new industries that will spring up in the train of the hydro-electric installations. Mr. Uigq apparently does not know that it is not the want of electric power that stands in the way of industrial development, but a combination of restrictive labour laws, bad government, and the discouragement of capital; The Hon.. C. M. Luke's attempt to traverse Me. Jenkinson's. able speech was a lamentable. performance, and his figures were at times ludicrous, as one example will show. Mr. Jenkinson had ' claimed that, the Prime Minister's estimate of the cost per horse-power in the Coleridge scheme was too . low, and Mr. Luke admitted that it was lower than Mr. Hay's. But, said Mr. Luke, Mr. Hay's estimate was based on a load factor of 100 per cent (which, by the way, it was not, as such a load factor is physically impossible in actual practice). Mr. Luke added that with a probable load factor of 20 to 30 per cent a proportionately small quantity of water and smaller outlay on headworlcs would be required. Mr. Luke evidently has not a notion .of what "load factor" means. He seems to think—LD that the higher the "load

factor" the higher the cost of production of a unit, and (2) that the smaller the plant the smaller the ''load factor." As we have already explained, the higher the "load factor" is the lower is the cost of production; while the. "load factor" has no relation to the size of a plant, any more than the ability of a man depends upon his girth. However, Me. Luke's Bpccch is quite as good as the speeches ■ and writings of most of those local critics who have been opposing the position held by Me. Jenkinson and Mr. Black, in tho meantime it is pleasant to find that so hopeful a friend of hydro-electric development as tho Christchurch I'ress has recognised the importance of IUR. Jen-, kinson's speech, which it describes as "a long and destructive criticism of the proposals from the commercial point of view." The Press summarises tho speech, and is r.eady to agree that elcctric power can be developed more cheaply by producer gas eng : nes than by water-power. Its final conclusion is that the experiment should be restricted to the Coleridge schema. The Hon. H. F. D igram is a staunch advocate of this scheme, which he defends in a long signed article in the lytteHon Times of Saturday. In the course of this article Mr. Wigram makes some observations that d:cerve very ■1 se attention. If his object, he writes, had been simply to urge priority for the Coleridge schemc lie not have been at the trouble of writing.

But (he adds) I want to go a great deal further. I believe that the movement we are new initiating is fraught with great possibilities—also with great dangers . . . This movement is not unlike that of earlier days when the railway system was inaugurated. I spoke of 'Yniwers," and one of them, is well illustrated by the "political railways" to catch votes I need not enlarge on them, as everyone knows how disastrous many of them have proved. There is bound to bo great pressure brought to bear on the Government to instnl power to some of the different constituencies. I hope that the long list of proposals sketched by the Prime Minister is not an indication that the Government will allow itself-'to be coerced. I believe that if it took up. a firm stand would receive very general 'support 'and' strengthen . its. position.

There is nothing new in .this argument to readers of The Dojiinxon. The significance of its present re-ik-rat:.on_lies in the fact thai: Mr. VVigbvm is Or strong supporter of th-3 party in power. We trust that if it should appear that the Bill will not be la d aside by the Council, Me. Wigr\m will n-ake the best of a bad job for the country by working for an amendment in Committee • that' will save the country from the great evil that threatens it in the Bill as it stands. . ■'