ELECTRIC POWER

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 71, 20 September 1930, Page 10

ELECTRIC POWER

STAND-BY PLANTS

NATIONAL POLICY

It is the intention of the Minister of Public Works (the Hon. W. B. Taverner) to place before Cabinet a scheme for the provision of standby plants throughout the country in order to be prepared for future failures of the larger hydro-electric power plants. An announcement to this effect was made by the Minister yesterday afternoon, when replying to a deputation of Canterbury members of Parliament, which interviewed him regarding the power shortage at Lake Coleridge.

The Minister said she intended to frame a national policy for the provision of auxiliary power in the event of future trouble. He knew enough about hydro-electric power works to realise that in dealing with the elemental forces of nature they could not expect to order those forces as they would like. During the past six months New Zealand had experienced peculiar conditions as far as the' weather was " concerned. "We have had a shortage at Waipori, a failure at Arapuni, caused by different circumstances, and now we are faced with an abnormally low rainfall in the area supplying Coleridge power station," said the Minister. "Everybody is powerless to do anything. This plainly shows that adequate provision must be made for steam-operated plants to take up the load when required. At the moment we are going into the whole question, and I hope before long to be able to submit to Cabinet proposals for a general policy in regard to tht' supply of electricity in New Zealand. The standby plants that exist to-day are totally inadequate for the job, and that is oue of the reasons why Christchurch, Timaru, and other districts are going short."

The Minister added that he would not stand in the way of the Christchureh City Council generating its own power from the Waimakariri River.