Power Boost Planned

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31585, 24 January 1968, Page 1

Power Boost Planned

The capacity of the transmission line from Islington to the Addington sub - station will be boosted to 500,000 kilowatts by next winter.

The gantries which now carry lines of 100,000 kilowatts capacity are being pulled down and replaced by higher towers. The work is the second of three stages in a programme started last year to increase the power supply to Christchurch to cope with requirements until about the turn of the century.

Already the New Zealand Electricity Department has doubled the capacity of the lines to the Papanui sub-sta-tion and it plans to boost the supply to Bromley before the winter. The district electrical engineer (Mr R. S. S. Meredith) said yesterday that the gantries between Sockburn and Addington had been partly dismantled to make room for the first of the new heavy lines. “Some special towers at Sockburn near the Wigram aerodrome painted in the international air obstruction colours are being erected and

these will be fitted with red obstruction lights,” he said. “When the first heavy line is completed the gantries down the transmission line reserve will be removed.” Mr Meredith said the gantries were no longer capable of holding the heavy conductors required for increasingly heavy loads. Many of the upright towers supporting the cross beams of the gantries are being sold to racing clubs for erection on racecourses as photography towers. The first set of new towers will be completed this week and the line will be in service by the end of March.