WHITE COAL.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXV, Issue 4726, 18 July 1924, Page 1

WHITE COAL.

s. O. WHAT AMERICA IS I’OTN«. WORKING ON SINGLE SYSTEM. While New Zealand is steadily extending her operations in hydro-elec-tricity the United States is reaching forward to the consummation of an electrical enterprise so vast that it must in the next decade produce profound changes in the life of the nation. An endeavour is being made to unite the whole of the country’s production and distribution of mechanical energy in a single system. Already the plan has been carried a long way towards realisation, writes the New York correspondent of the “Times.” In the Pacific States an unbroken line of electric power stations stretches for 1200! miles, and presently a similar unbroken line will stretch for 1600 miles.between Canada and Mexico. In part of New England and over a group of the Southern States there are other large- systems, all ready to be a part of the great articulation. And but very recently nine light and power companies in Pennsylvania organised still another combination of plants which, when the time comes, will be fitted into the system. In the south-east there is a plan for putting the errant and destructive Colorado River to work, which will certainly result in the creation of.yet one more l system that, can be included in the eventual greater union. CO-OPERATION ESSENTIAL. It is not clear .who originated the idea of a universal system of power,, but probably it gradually grew up oiit of the realisation that .there must be co-operation between States when rivers which have scant respect for political boundaries were to be utilised to produce electricity or any other form of power. More than that, there had to be co-operation with the Federal Government if rivers were to be dammed for power plants, because all the navigable waters of the country are under the jurisdiction of the War Department. The Federal Government took no really important action for the encouragement of new power enterprises until about four years ago, when Congress created the Federal Power Commission. In the short time that the commission has been functioning it has issued licenses for the installation of plants with a total capacity for producing 7,500,000-h.p., and under its authority plants with a capacity of 2,400,000-h.p. have been built, or are being built. Previously there had been built under the Federal authorities over a period of 20 years plants with a capacity of but 1,400,000-h.p. in all. HYDRO TAKES SECOND PLAGE. How vast the development of electric power has been in recent years can be seen from the fact that, whereas in 1919 the output of all plants in the United States was 38,921,000 of kilowatt hours, by 1923 it had risen to 55,928,000,000 of kilowatt hours. In the earlier year 37.5 per cent, of the total output of electric energy was produced by.water power and 62.5 per cent, oy coal and other fuels ; but in 1923 the proportion had changed to 35 1 and 64.9 per cent. The alteration in the ratio is significant. It means not a diminution in water power enterprises, but an increase at a relatively faster rate of plants producing electricity from coal, oil, and other fuel. Carbo-electric plants are, of course generally cheaper to instal, though not cheaper to maintain, than hydro-electric plants. And not only is coal comparatively inexpensive in the United States, but improvements have been made in the methods of using it, so that only 2.41 b is required to produce a kilowatt hour of electricity. as against 3.21 b in 1919.