CORRESPONDENCE.

Grey River Argus, 16 April 1929, Page 8

CORRESPONDENCE.

GREY POWER BOARD LOAN, (To the Editor.) Sir, —At the very moment Grey rate payers are considering whether thev would be wise to embark on a large capital expenditure for hydro-electri-cal works, to meet the increasing p Ow . er needs of the district. A new era is dawning for the coal industry. In almost every country of the world scientific investigations concerning the more efficient use of coal have been in progress for years, and as a result numerous successful commercial applications are now in existence. The fact that un il quite recently it lias been possible to harness only one-sixth of the power contained in raw coal, even with the; most modern steam plant, gav e the investigator ample scope, and even in this country we find our industries taking advantage of ;he resulting developments. The feature of these developments which interests this district, with its abund aace s. coa., is the tendency towards distillation and by-product -. If distillation of epal can be developed in this country, as .i is being done in others thgre is a very bright and extensive future for our coal industry; but one essential feature of every distillation process is that the whole of the pro duets of the process shall find an outlet. The majority of he products can be handled or packed for shipment eco nomically at the work', which must necessarily be situated on the coal fields. Some of the products cannot be shipped away economically, but provide a cheap and efficient fuel for power production for the district of ■ heir origin. A very few years will be required to prove the economic sue cess of these processes, and with these pro'pects in view, one rightly won ders whether a heavy capital expenditure, with its accompanying large an nual interest bill, probably larger than the fuel bill of the future, should be undertaken by the Power Board in the meantime, especially when it is rea lised that the hydro source will still be available later on, if required. In the Waikato coalfields the electors are looking upon the completion of th' Arapuni scheme with apprehension, ar this scheme will mean the loss of at least 150,000 tons of slack coal pe> year; this to t>e miners and the towns depending on the miners, such as the West Coast possess, is a very serious problem. AVould the voting of tho Power Board’s proposed loan be advisable to the Grey Power Board when all the e facts are made known. If the Power Board are as reliable it their facts as they are of reports of meetings, then ib e whole of their alleged facts can be taken, with a grabof salt. For instance, I am authorita tively informed that at, the Blaekbal meeting, held last Sunday, where if was reported that about 300 attendedonly about 60 were present, and ths majority of those were not ratepayers It behoves the elec ors to weigh the facts very carefully, before doing anything that will injure the di trict at a whole—l am, etc, INTERESTED RATEPAYER.

[Our correspondent has only to re fer to the Blackball Miners’ Union for corroboration of our report, as to tin attendance at the meeting which the Power Board members addressed on Sunday. T o say there w- only 60 present is a misrepresent, non. as it was the meeting of the Miners’ Union, of U-hich almost all of the members were present.—Ed, Argus.)