HYDRO-ELECTRIC POWER

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 21990, 14 January 1937, Page 10

HYDRO-ELECTRIC POWER

“VERY LARGE POTENTIAL SOURCE” MANAPOURI-DEEP COVE SCHEME ' (PRESS ASSOCIATION TELEGRAM.) AUCKLAND, January 13. “Assuming that sufficient flat land would be available, there is at least om very large potential source of power in the West Coast sounds area which might be considered in future for the establishment of electrochemical industries,” said Mr S. H. Wilson, of the Dominion Laboratory, in discussing at the Science Congress the outlook for the profitable utilisation of large amounts of cheap surplus power in New Zealand. Mr Wilson drew attention to the proposal to make a tunnel from Lake Manapouri to Deep Cove, thus making available 250,000 horse-power that could be used for electro-chemical industries. The possible electro-chemical industries which might be established were, he said, the production of aluminium, ferro-alloys, electric pig iron, calcium carbide, and phosphoric fertilisers. Some of these industries, however, were ruled out for a long time to come by the present world overproduction, or by existing efficiency, as was the case with phosphoric fertilisers. The possibilities would depend on the cost of power an industry actually used. The cost of hydro-electric power was conditioned mainly by the capital cost, and it was claimed for the Manapouri-Deep Cove scheme that the capital cost a horse-power would be very low. Taking the power to be developed initially as 125.000 horsepower, with a capital cost at £ls a horse-power, the installation cost of the scheme would be £1,875,000, with an additional £ 146,200 for interest and depreciation. Power would be relatively cheap, however, only if all the power available was continuously used, and the difficulties confronting the scheme through present production in other countries seemed to show that the only prospects were for electro-thermal industries in which the technique and plant were similar for different products. Such products requiring a large amount of power were ferro-alloys, carbide and cyanamide, and phosphoric acid for fertilisers; and these appeared to offer the best prospects for using any cheap power that should be made available in the sounds region. The difficulty with any scheme there involving the development of a large amount of power would be to start with sufficient production, so as to use most of the power and so keep unit costs small; and production on this scale involved marketing difficulties which would react </. a nationalistic policy.