SAVE DAYLIGHT AND RELIEVE POWER SHORTAGE PAINLESSLY

Press, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23248, 7 February 1941, Page 8

SAVE DAYLIGHT AND RELIEVE POWER SHORTAGE PAINLESSLY

ELECTRICAL “PEAK LOADS”

When King George V gave a radio broadcast to Britain, one of the midland power stations found that they had a sudden and unexpected load of about 20,000 k.w. (about 27.000 horsepower!. The reason for this was a several hundred thousand people m the district served by this power station had all switched on their radio sets at the same time, to listen Majesty’s address. Each set takes very mt!e power, but when they ani numbered by the hundred thousand, th y can make a serious problem for power supply authorities. Or subS ouent occasions when the King ga an address, the power stations knew what to expect. A peak load, then, may seem to you to be some sort of “pain-in-the-neck for electrical engineers, which ordinary people cannot be expected to understand, much less to alleviate or to cure. But there is more to it than that In New Zealand, we have a hydro-electric supply system owned and run by the State, which means to say that it belongs to you and me and all the other New Zealanders and if we do not know the first thing about it, our ignorance may be expensive. “More Milk, Please!” Can you imagine an absentee farmowner ringing up his farm manager and saying: . , - “I am giving a party for a lot or children to-morrow. Send me an extra 40 gallons of milk, and five gallons or cream!” ~ “But I am already sending you air the cows are giving. We have some

more cows coming in in.three months time, but I can’t supply any more now than you are getting already!” "Coiping in in three months? I don’t understand these technical matters. It is your job to supply all the milk I want!” And he rings off. Well, even if absentee farmers do not behave like that, still that is not very far from our attitude towards electricity supply. We turn on a switch, and expect ‘‘the juice” to be there; and so it is, but at what cost? Often it is at the cost of peak loads. A bulk supply of electricity is not sold by the unit; the cost depends upon the highest peak load In each period of three months.

“Peak loads” do not depend, usually, upon radio sets. They are the result of various things happening at the same time. They are at their worst in winter, when some people want to use lighting and heating and cooking at the end of the afternoon, while others want to go home by tram or electric train, while the day’s commercial and industrial load is still “on.” And so everything happens at once. If the lighting load could be made to come rather later, the peak load would be much less severe. Less machinery would have to be provided to meet

(Specially written for “The Press” by ARTHUR LUSH, BJD., A.MJ. C £.)

the demand for power, less coal be burned, less, of would be side-tracked atttoSl to keep ‘‘business as usuailivhijpTr nation is fighting for its life, In Peace and War At ordinary times, the demand fo* electricity is always estimated fm some years ahead, and power statimi and turbines and generators are b stalled, so that when a peak load « curs an extra machine is there to mM it. But in war time, the extra machfoT or even the whole equipment fets new power house, is liable to be still on order, and delivery delayed until some not-quite-definite date. Mean while the peak loads have to be taken by the “stand-by” plants, which »» fuel-operated power stations. liji s j! an expensive matter; so much so thil daylight saving has a new and ineresj. ing importance. At ordinary tima there is a good case for advancing ft. clock by an hour during the summer months. In war time, to reduce out peak loads, there is ample reason for keeping the clock advanced by (hat hour, right through the year, as they are now doing in Britain. This chane* would mean our using less lighting fo the early evening and more in the early morning, and so it would heb to prevent the lighting load from be. ing heaped on top of all the other loads on winter evenings. It has been estimated that the winter peak loaj. in the North Island could be reduced in this way by 35,000 k.w., with a fur. ther reduction of 8000 k.w. in the South Island, thus taking 43,000 k.w off our peak loads. Adolf’s Pleasure The value of this saving is consider, able. At normal times, and in the most favourable circumstances ft|

selling cost of that amount of water power would be £ 172,000 for each winter. But steam power- is more expensive than our water the times are not there was a coal shortage, anc some train services had to be cancelled until after the present daylight saving came into operation. During the time of that shortage, great efforts must; have been needed to keep the fuel power stations working. \ Peak loads tend to push up a bit’® higher each year. Next winter it will be harder to provide for them than it was in 1940. Owing to the war, we are already short of developed hydro-electric power; and steam stations have their limits. When.these are reached, restrictions are forced upon us. The choice now is between the present expensive shortage, which may become inconvenient and even serious, and for which we can bum® ourselves, our representatives, mm, m course, Adolf Hitler, who would he very pleased about it; or, as the economical alternative, one hour’s adv»M of the clock throughout the whole year. The hour’s advance of the doc* is certainly the most painless way oj keeping peak loads in check untu hydro-electric development can get ahead of them once more.