SMOKE NUISANCE

Evening Post, Volume CXXVII, Issue 45, 23 February 1939, Page 11

SMOKE NUISANCE

EFFECT ON HEALTH

HARBOUR BOARD'S ACTION

"The Harbour Board has spent a large sum of money in providing a great contribution to the health of the city by removing the smoke nuisance as far as our power station is-con-cerned," said the chairman of the Harbour Board (Mr. C. M. Turrell) at a meeting of the board last night, after commenting on Physical Fitness Week. "The smoke from the chimney ot the board's pumping station on Waterloo Quay has, for a great number of years, been the cause of complaint, more particularly from shipping companies and from the owners and occu* piers of buildings in Thorndon. The pumping plant, which is used to" operate the cranes and other Hydraulic machinery, is served by two larger and two small boilers and is normally-; operated for fourteen hours a day. Up to the present these boilers have beea hand fired and although when the load was steady there was not much smoke, when, owing to fluctuations in load, the boilers had to be fired quickly, the . smoke volume was considerable." CHANGE-OVER UNDERTAKEN. In October, 1936, to reduce the smoke nuisance, the board decided to change over to the use of pulverised coal, Mr. Turrell continued, and as this entailed a good deal of alteration to the boiler combustion chambers, the opportunity was taken to reconstruct the boilers and rebuild the foundations. "This work has been completed on the two large boilers, and oil burners have been fitted to the two small boilers," said Mr. Turrell. "Hand-firing is thus now a thing of the past, unles* any serious breakdown occurs. As 3 . precautionary measure the large boilers are so arranged that in the event of a mishap to the pulverising plant, they can be changed over to burn oil in about half an hour. "As the station had to be kept i:i operation, the boilers could only be altered singly and so the change-over has taken a good deal of .time, but it is pleasing to report that the improvement in the gases given off from the chimney is most marked. The changeover has also given a much cleaner boilerhouse and much better control ofy a fluctuating load. "I wish to call the attention of other ! concerns who may still further heJjl the city by adopting similar method* i'with their chimneys."