ELECTRICITY SCHEMES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVII, Issue 17571, 9 September 1920, Page 4

ELECTRICITY SCHEMES.

The proposal of the Mount Eden Borough Council to establish an independent electricity generating plant was the subject of an interesting discussion during yesterday's interview between an Auckland deputation and the Minister for Public Works. Incidentally, reference was

made to the popular idea that ai advantage would be gained by plae ing a steam power-station on a coa] field, the argument, of course, being ihat the cost of fuel would be reJuced by the saving of transport There is, however, another factor tc oe weighed and this is a decisive objection. The scheme ' depends lpon an uninterrupted supply of coal Tom the site of the station •; if alterlative supplies are to be used, th« mticipated economy vanishes. Consequently the owner of the powerstation must also be the owner ol he coalmine, or the cost of fuel will 3e an unknown item. More import int still, there must be a complete guarantee against stoppage of the joal output, and no one has yet de ?ised certain guarantees of thai sharacter. The station on the sea iront has certainly to pay railage or its local coal supply, but in ar jmergency it can draw upon sea aorne coal and maintain the service \s represented to the Minister bj Mr. Joll, the Mount Eden scheme was to buy electricity in bulk fron ,he City Council, but having failed tc nake such an arrangement, to erect e steam plant of its own; eventuallj ;he Mount Eden scheme is to "work n" with the Government supply. Apparently it has not occurred to he Mount Eden Council that its re-

sponsibilities will not disappear with | the delivery of hydro-electricity to its boundaries. It will require a stand-by plant against the risk of interruption in the main service, and a contract for a bulk supply from the City Council would be of no advantage unless it secured an emergency service after the transfer to hydro-electricity. The alternative proposal of an independent steam plant is also economically unsound. A few weeks ago the Wellington City Council sought the advice of Mr. Birks, the chief electrician of the Public Works Department. He recommended the abandonment of the present site in the city and the erection of a new station on the

Evans Bay waterfront, mainly to secure direct access to coal supplies and to unrestricted quantities of water for condensing purposes, and in reference to stand-by requirements declared, " the larger the unit the better." Mr. Coates

touched the weak point of the Mount Eden policy when he asked why there should not be a single scheme for the whole Auckland district, and the considerations of economy inrl efficiency that suggested this question will probably appeal with equal force to the ratepayers of Mount Eden when they are consulted. Local schemes will in fact fail in their purpose unless they are capable of co-ordination with the national supply, and if local authorities cannot find a basis of co-opera-tion their proposals should be subjected to the criticism of the Government engineers before they are sanctioned by the ratepayers.