MANGAHAO POWER

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 80, 5 April 1926, Page 8

MANGAHAO POWER

THE COST OF THE STATION

COMPARISON WITH COLERIDGE

A MILLION MOBE AND LESS

ENEKGY.

The efficiency of the Mangahao power scheme, having regard to the vast amount of money spent on it by the Government, is questioned by the Napier •iDaily Telegraph," which in the course of an article on the "Progress of Electricity," makes a comparison with the Lake Coleridge scheme, Canterbury, and the possibilities of Waikaremoana.

Apart from Lake Coleridge, a very Bound undertaking, tho policy of the Government in regard to hydro-electric-ity has been largely of the "bull-at-a-gate" order, says the "Telegraph.^' It made an enormous blunder when it decided to shunt tho exploitation of Waik'aremoana until after Mangahao had been completed. It is very difficult to search out official figures giving the cost of Mangahao, but it is possible to get near an approximation by burrowing in that useful publication the Year Book. The average output of Mangahao, if the estimates made are realised, will be 21,000 horse power— 24,000 horse power in wet seasons and 18,000 in dry. The plant capacity of Lake Coleridge is 36,000 horse power. Yet on the 31st March, 1925, the expenditure at Mangahao was nearly a million in excess of the expenditure at Lake Coleridge, the actual figures at that date being: Lake Coleridge £1,096,----261, and Mangahao £1,903,715. It is now clear that the ultimate cost will be over two million. Double the Mangahao output could have been obtained at Waikaremoana at an estimated cost of £544,369. If we adopt the extreme attitude of demanding that the, Waikaremoana estimate should b doubled, then it is tha case that for half an average output of 21,000 horse power. 40,000 horse power could have been obtained from Waikaremoana. AN ARGUMENT FOR WAIKARE-. MOAN A. When the Mangahao scheme was commenced the 'Government had before it an estimate by its electrical engineer that 136,000 horse power —enough to electricise the whole of the North Island for a couple of generations or more—could be obtained at Waikaremoana for £1,272,305. This was on a basis of 12 per cent, above pre-war prices. If to that we add another 50 per cent, to be on the safe side, the total cost of obtaining 136,000 horse power would be £1,918,457, or approximately what it has cost up to the 31st March, 1925, to develop an average output of 21,000 horse power at Mangahao. In considering these details we have to remember that the unanimous verdict of ■ engineers is that Waikaremoana is the easiest and cheapest hydro-electrical proposition in New Zealand, and therefore that we have erred very much on the safe side by suggesting 50 per cent, increase on the original estimate of £1,272,305. "A HUGE LOSS." It was announced that the completion of Mangahao would mean a supply for Taranaki and Wellington, with some left over sufficient to reach as far as Dannevirke. Taranaki soon realised that current from Mangahao would be too costly, as did Wellington. The Wellington City Council expressed its views by building another large powerhouse of its own. Taranaki, already possessing a plant developing 4000 horse power at New Plymouth, is now by its power board completing a plant on the Mangi vi Biver to develop a further 2000 horse power. The consequence is that not only is Mangahao able to supply as far as Dannevirke, but to Waipukurau and Waipawa also, and the discussion now in progress between the Hawkes Bay Power Board and the Napier City Council arises because the Government is striving to get rid of •Mangahao current in Napier, and, although' offering to sell at less than cost, because the price asked is alleged to compare unfavourably with the price of current generated at the council's own power-house. We are inclined to question this, but the point is- that the Goyenment by its Mangahao blunder has involved the country in a huge loss.