HYDRO-ELECTRIC POWER.

Auckland Star, Volume XLII, Issue 211, 5 September 1911, Page 6

HYDRO-ELECTRIC POWER.

THE WAIKAREMOANA SCHEME. (By Telegraph.—Parliamentary Reporter.) WETXmCTON, this day. Interviewed this morning on the subject of the Coleridge water power works, the Miuistcr for Public Works | said that at the end of August 32 men i I were employed. Making a road to tbe power-house and generally carrying out the work of preparation. The construe- | | tion of the tunnel from the Lake for the j I conveyance of water to the power-bouse I i would be commenced before the end of i I the month. The scheme would be com- j j ploted about IS months or two years, but ; ! this was largely dependent on the quality I of <he material met in driving the tunnel. Over a hundred meu would be employed on the work in a few weeks and more later on. Questioned on the prospects of the Waikaremoana scheme, the Minister, said Mr. Parry, chief electrical enginer, would make an examination as soon as ho could spar the time. That was one of the first matters that would be inquired ■ into. The llutt scheme would come later. These matters required a great deal of | investigation, examination and exploraI tion, added Minister, in order to find l out which was the most suitable. "WaiI karemoana," he added, "will be a very ] big scheme, and it may be possible to do without the Hutt schemo altogether, ft is possible that Waikaremoana may supply the whole of th e.North Island | from Auckland to the Wellington. It is I less than three hundred miles from the ; Lake to either place, and electricity can easily be transmitted that distanco, and | thre is sufficient power there to fulfil the j ■ requirements of the Island for the | next twenty or thirty years at anl rate. | Nothing, however, will be done uptil Mr. < ; Parry has made his examination, and he j i will do that during the summer."