POWER FROM THE WAVES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIII, Issue 971, 25 March 1911, Page 4

POWER FROM THE WAVES.

Mr Mark Saunders, well-known as the inventor and proprietor of the contrivance on the north mole at Timaru for getting power from the sea, is still working late and early with an energy and enthusiasm which certainly deserve success. Mr Saunders (says the Timaru Herald) has spent half a lifetime in an endeavour to perfect his scheme, and is confident that the goal is now in sight. The only thing which has kept it back so long, he says, was the lack of the necessary funds to prosecute the work as it should have been prosecuted ; and he finds scant consolation in the knowledge that it is the lot of the poor inventor to be trodden upon, while others reap the harvest of his inventive genius. With the aid of a trio of long iron tubes with funnelshaped ends to catch the waves, Mr Saunders is now leading the water up from the eastern side of the rocks, from which it is intended to run down and drive a turbine on the other side. In addition to the three tubes referred to, there is a fourth one for compressing air, and Mr Saunders says there is no reason why any number of tubes should not be put down along the mole according to the power required. He is confident that in this way sufficient power is available to drive all the machinery in Timaru, and to serve the whole district within a radius of 40 miles, and that at a cost which would mark a very big saving on present methods. The scheme may be seen in operation on a small scale. What Mr Saunders has done with his crude appliances, he maintains, is quite sufficient to show that with a proper plant there is not only gold, but diamonds, in sight for whoever reaps the reward of his labours.