Power from the Tides.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 18070, 12 May 1924, Page 8

Power from the Tides.

The cabled statement of the British Minister Of LftbOUr that the Government will facilitate the carrying "but of the Severn power scheme, if the investigating committee's report is favourable, is the first reference in four years', to a bold engineering project which captured the imagination of the country in 1920. The author, BrigadierGeneral Sir Ale*. Gibb, was a pupil of Brunei, and is one'of Britain's foremost civil engineers. During the War he . was in ohargo Of military p6rt Construction, and When ho explained the Severn scheme he wAs Director of Civil Engineering for the Ministry Of Transport. Ths proposal was to build «o huge dains across the estuary of the fiver, and, by gates, to for&S the .outgoing tide through turbines, thUB developing- '.'upwards of 1,060,0fi0 h.pi" As the power from neap tides was estimated to i>e only one-foufth' of that from spring tides, it was also proposed to X bnild a great pumping station (operated by,the electrical power developed by_the tide barrage), and pUmp the surplus water a miie through a tunnel into an artificiallake hbove Txntern Abbey. Thus & steady fall of water would be assured, irrespective of the SdaSOn of exteiit.of the tide. To the originators of Such swSepirig plans it WttS a Sfnall matter to add that the railmight be carried' OVer the dams, which wouid->"do away with the objec- " tkmabie Severn tUnneh" the " World's greatest water power " scheme," was to provide work for 280,000 men for seven years, and since that wOuld relieve the .unemployment position .Vfery greatly, it is not. surprising t6 find the Labour Government looking With kindly eyes on a scheme Which WOUld bring it the blessing of so many ; electors* T'-e cost of the work WAS 1 estimated at £25,000,000 to £30,000,000, which WOuld meftn an average annual expenditure of about £4,000,000, spread over the period. Loans, however, can generally be procured for productive wOrks, and, on the credit side, it was expected that .the scheme would rosult in a saving of 4,000,000 tons of coal a year, the value

of which -would greatly exceed the year's expenditure. Further, the scheme would be attractive to industry, which, the world over, is clamouring * fof a more assured and Idas expensive source of power than coal. It was Citlislatdd that power could be produced for $d a Unit, and cheap electric iighting and energy brought withifl the reach of the thickly populated industrial of "Wales and the West Midlands. Dock extensions were aldo proposed at Brls-. tol, which, controlling cheap power, transport, and shipping facilities, was expected to become the export centre for the whole of western England's manufactures. It will be interesting to see the effect of this revival on industry—to note whether the public imagination is as bold as it was in the first flushed days of "reconstruction," And whether the captains of industry retain the same faith in State aid.