HYDRO-ELECTRIC SCHEMES

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 60, 4 December 1917, Page 8

HYDRO-ELECTRIC SCHEMES

NAPIER PEOPLE ACTIVE

PLANS FOR WAIKAREMOAM.

In recent months there has beeir. taken a very keen interest in proposals, which the Government is supposed toentertain for the establishment of schemes for the supply of watcr-gen-erated electric current to towns and. cities in different parts of New Zealand. As soon as the Government seemed to be taking notice of the request of the people of Wellington to have current supplied from a river in the Shannon district, the people of Timarui began to work up an agitation to have* their town joined up to the Lake Coleridge scheme in accordance with a promise alleged to have been given when; the Lake Coleridge enterprise was embarked upon. A deputation was to> have come to Wellington to meet as. many Ministers as possible, in order to voice the protest of the people of Timaru against "experimenting with new schemes in the North Island before the Coleridge enterprise was fullydeveloped. Also, the Napier people began to talk about the suggested "Waikaremoana scheme. They appear to have> taken it for granted, that the scheme is going through before long, and they have arranged a conference of local bodies between Napier and Gisborne to determine the route to be taken by the main lines to carry the current into the Poverty Bay district. The conference is 'to take placo to-morrow,, and the Minister of Public Works is. going v to Napier this morning 111 order' to be present at it. There is to bo a: banquet in the evening after the conference, and it wa6 part of the plan that a joint deputation would wait 011 the Minister 011 Thursday. Howevor, the Minister is to leave Napier ® ai v on Thursday morning, so that the deputation, if'it is to take place at all, must happen at some other time. All these preparations do not nectsfisarilv mean that the people of are'to have their scheme before Wellington and some other places are given! cheap current-. In such public statements as have been made it has been, more or less agreed by the Government and the Government officers that the first two schemes to be partaken aw the Shannon scheme for and the harnessing of the A\ aikato fort the benefit of the Auckland district-. Neither of these works are likely to be undertaken for a- long time yet, so tliab the Waikarcmnana scheme must, sr some distance from realisation.