WHEN NIAGARA RUNS DRY.

Golden Bay Argus, Volume IX, Issue 68, 15 September 1904, Page 2

WHEN NIAGARA RUNS DRY.

7,000,000 HORSE POWER WAIT-

ING TO BE HARNESSED

Ono of the most striking examples of the utilitarian spirit of the 20th century is to bo found on the present

rate of water-power development at Niagara Falls.

Professor Uiiwin has estimated the force of the groat cataract at seven million horse power, or an equivalent to the latent force in the world's daily output of coal. Charters for the utilisation of 22 per cent of this vast amount have already been granted. Only 100,000 horse power is as yet available, but work is in progress on both sides of the rivor for the harnessing of about 270,000 more. On the United States side, the Niagara Falls Power Company, which represents probably the most famous installation in the world, and which is privileged by its charter to take 200,000 horse power from the upper river, is now increasing its development from 55,000 to 110,000. The intake and power houses are situated at a point a mile and a quarter above the falls, where two wheelpits, each 180 feet deep ' and 400 feet long have been excavated out of the solid rock. Here the water is directed from the intake canal into a huge penstock, through which it is dropped into -the turbins 110 feet below, and is thence carried off to the lower river by means of a tunnel, a mile and a third long, running beneath the city at a depth of 200 feet.

How the FALLS ARE HARNESSED

The water wheels are connected by means of shafts with dynamos on the ground floor of the power-house each dynamo generating 7,000 H.P. The flow of the water in each penstock equals 3,000 gallons per second. On the same side of the river the Niagara Falls Hydraulic Power Company develops 40,000 horse power and is increasing its plant to utilise 60,000 more. The intake is made about half a mile above the falls, and from this point the water in conveyed through the city in an open canal to the edge of the cliff below the cataract, where it is dropped through the largest steel penstock in the world to turbines just above the level of the lower river. This company is limited to 7,700 cubic feet of water per second.

Host interesting of all from an engineering point of view is the Toronto and Niagara Power Company's works, which is the third coeporation privileged to develop power on the Canadian side. Its intake is situated up the stream, midway between those of the Ontario Power Company and the Canadian Niagara Power Company. Its power house is built out partly over the river, and in order tbat. it may not" inter fere w'lth the works "of x tho other companies', it had to excavate its tail race under the bed of the upper river, beginning at a depth of about 180 feet below the surface.; LORD KEL VAN'S FORECAST. Any description of the use made of the 100,000 horse power at present available necessarily abounds in superlatives. At the Niagara Falls Power Company the largest transformer in the world is used to transmit electric power to Buffalo, 23 miles away. Quite the most beautiful use ever made of Niagara Falls power was the lighting at the Pan-American Exposition. Here 5,000 horse power was used for the 300,000 lights that outlined the roofs, domes, cornices and windows of all the buildings, thus creating a spectacular effect that has as yet been unequalled.

Speaking on the subject, Lord Kelvin once said, "I look forward to the time when the whole water from Lake Eric will find its way to the lower level of Lake Ontario through machinery, doing more good for the world than the great benefit which wo now possess in the contemplation of the splendid scene now presented by the waterfalls of Niagara."—"Science Sittings.'-! ,•£,