The Te Aroha News Published Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday Mornings. SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1925. ELECTRICAL STOVES.

Te Aroha News, Volume XLI, Issue 6573, 7 February 1925, Page 4

The Te Aroha News Published Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday Mornings. SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1925. ELECTRICAL STOVES.

THE proposal that the Thames Valley Electric Power Board should offer to place 50 electric stoves in the homes of consumers on the hire purchase system was not adopted without strong! opposition. The chairman (Mr Claxtbn) before placing his scheme before the Financial' Committee of the Board, had furnished himself with'all the data that was procurable and he stated the case in favour of his scheme with his usual ability. On the question of whether cooking by electricity is profitable to the consumer the people have been very much in the dark, and it has been almost impossible to obtain information that would justify a definite conclusion. • Mr . Claxton’s proposals were, to a large extent, the outcome of experiments made by several people at Thames, who purchased their own stoves and kept records over a period sufficiently long, and with such results, that Mr Claxton was quite satisfied that cooking by electricity is within the teach of any ordinary working man. and that once a stove goes into a home on the hire purchase system it will never come out. There need be no hesitation in accepting the data placed before the Board, and from a consumer’s point of view the scheme appears to be a sound one. The main object of the scheme is to encourage the use of electricity between the peak loads and as the Board pays all round the clock on the peak load which, at present, only continues o-ver brief periods in. the morn-

ing. and evening there are many hours in the day during which electricity is, as far as the Board is concerned, being wasted. It is paying for something which it is not using. The stoves, it is believed, would be in use chiefly when the load is low, and if so the revenue would be increased to the value of the electricity consumed by the stoves with only a slight addition, if any, to the amount which the Board will have to pay for current taken from the Government. If many stoves were used between 4.30 pan. and 6.30 pan. they would affect the peak load, but even in such a case it is estimated by the engineer on the law of averages that the Board would still make a profit. Mr Arthur, who opposed the scheme, held that it would give |Some ratepayers an advantage over others and that the period allowed for re-payment was too long. He further urged that if the Board was in a position to dispose of electrical appliances on- such favourable terms, the terms should first apply to the motors used by farmers. Mr Claxton met the latter argument by pointing out J that every fresh motor put on increased the charges which the Board had to meet to the Government while the stoves would have no effect upon these charges. Another objection raised was that the scheme would add to the administration charges of the Board. Stress was also laid upon the possibility that the Board would have to put in larger transformers and strengthen some of the lines to carry the heavier load made necessary by the stoves, but this would only be necessary if a number of stoves were on the same line, when the probabilities are that they will be widely distributed. After all the objections have been taken into consideration the Board appears to be on safe ground, and if the experiment proves successful and can be extended great benefits will be derived by the ratepayers generally, for as Mr Claxton "‘pointed out, the only way to prevent the heavy loans for electrical schemes becoming a burden to the taxpayers was to encourage every man and woman to use electricity.