ELECTRIFYING COUNTRY DISTRICTS.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXIV, Issue 9419, 15 April 1909, Page 3

ELECTRIFYING COUNTRY DISTRICTS.

In the American Review; of Reviews for January Mr Donald Cameron Shafer interprets “the the brook.” He says itjwas the noisy cataract that answered when the world lifted np its voice for more mechanical energy to drive the wheels of the cities. Now itt is the whispering meadow brook which volunteers to do the hard work of the country districts, to enrich the soil, and to take the place of coal. The enormous consumption of ooal and oil, and the enormous waste of coal in the mines, threaten the speedy extinction of both supplies of fuel. The land is spider-webbed with countless -streams, big and little, which represent enough industrial energy to do all the farming work many times over, and leave enough energy to light every city and town, and furnish light and heat for every building. Enough water rolls past St. Louis to turn all the wheels in the United States. Enough water power is still undeveloped in Massachusetts to equal the flow of Niagara. The rivulets and streams are now being harnessed ALADDIN’S LAMP REVIVED. The old mill dams supplied power for the obsolete sawmills in the Eastern States, but the power can now bo changed into electrical energy and transmitted any distance to tbe farms or villages. All through the Eastern States the old mill ponds are being repaired and used to generate electrical power. One case is mentioned at Lawyeraide, New York, where a little plant consists of a 9in. upright turbine of 5 horse ?ower, running with a 15ft head, he dynamo, which is a 4 horsepower machine, will take care of sixty ordinary lights, will drive a milk separator, milk the cows, turn a grindstone, fanning mill or feed grinder, out the ensilage, or drive a dozen other small machines. It is capable of doing the work of three hired men, and will furnish all the comforts of electric light besides at a very insignificant cost for maintenance. The installation costs something like this : Dynamo, £26; turbine water wheel, £l2; waterwheel governor,'£ls; line wire, £l3; total cost. £7o—less than the year’s wages of a hired man. WHAT A £lO DYNAMO DOES. At another farm the farmer bought fifteen years ago for £lO a small dynamo and a quantity of electrical fixtures at a sale. He installed the dynamo in his saw-mill and wired bis own house for electrioty. Every night since then this little generator baa been producing a continuous electricity, with no further attention than occasional oiling, to light the large country home and all the out-buildings. A near-by church is also illuminated, and the streets of the tiny settlement are nightly ablaze with electrio lights. The actual cost of his current is practically nothing. Dynamo and turbine paid for themselves more than a dozen years ago. ELEOTRIO MILKING.

The hamlet of East Worcester, with less than two hundred inhabitants, boasts all the comforts and conveniences of electricity, generated by an ancient saw-mill storage pond. Where farms are close together, near abundant water power, the farmers have erected a mutual plant and sell to distant neighbours. At Little Falls the milking is done by electric power, stables are electrically lighted and do the farm work, YOKING WIND AND SUN In the great West, where water is scarce, farmers are utilising their wind-mills to generate current for light and power. A storage, battery is provided to store away enough electricity to last a day or two in case the wind fails. Wind and water nower are combined to fill a hydraulic accumulator, which, develops current. In California the sun is harnessed to develop electrical power for farm work. Huge reflectors follow the* course of the sun and focus the rays on a boiler. The steam is conveyed to a small engine which drives the generator. So in South America, Swiss valleys, tea and cotton fields in India, the African veldt, the farmers are beginning to use electricity for agricultural purposes. In the United States out of 5577 central stations and cities, 4357 exist in towns of less than 5000 inhabitants.