ELECTRIC POWER

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22971, 24 February 1938, Page 14

ELECTRIC POWER

NEW STATION PLANNED USE OF RAKAIA RIVER PROVISION FOR FUTURE [nv TELEGRAPH —PRESS ASSOCIATION*] CHRISTCHUTtCH, Wednesday Provision for the erection in a few years of a hydro-electric station capable of developing 17,000 kilowatts, equal to half the output of tho Lako Coleridge station, is being made by the Public Works Department. The site of the projected station is on the southern bank of the Rakaia River directly north of Methven, where the diversion race supplying water for irrigation purposes to the Ashburton-Lyndhurst and Hinds-Mayfiold areas will dip down into the Rakaia after a 40-mile run over the Downs country and plains when completed. No date for the commencement of the station will be fixed for a long time yet. The new station will be an important unit in the links of the electricitygenerating chain now connecting Lako Coleridge, Waitaki and Waipori. Tho value will be that a full head of water of 1000 cusecs will be available for turning tho turbine in winter time. No water will then require to be diverted into the irrigation races. A factor of still greater influence in the decision was that in the winter months tho flows of water to the Waitaki and Lake Coleridge stations are low, both the present main stations depending for supplies upon glacier sources. The site lends itself naturally to the purposes of a power station, there being a fall of 350 feet from the terrace where the diversion race will ond to the selected site of tho station.