DAMMING NIAGARA.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 12244, 16 February 1918, Page 4

DAMMING NIAGARA.

A £20,000,000 PROJECT

The Niagara Falls is one of the groat natural assets of the American Continent. not merely as a spectacle, drawing tourists from all over the world, but as a huge source or energy tnat, by the genius of man. can he harnessed to the wheels of industry. Huge electro-chem-ical plants flank the Niagara Falls on both the Canadian and American sides, and it is the cheap supply of energy from tho rushing waters of the fails that has enabled America to compete in tho electro-chemical industry at a tremendous advantage over other nations.

But legislation stands in the way of the full utilisation of the power stored up in the Niagara Falls. By treaty between the Unites States and Great Britain, enough of the waters of the Niagara River above the falls can be diverted to the American and the Canadian side to generate about 790,200 horse-power, but circumstanc -s have interfered with the complete utilisation of this volume of water. A year ago industries or. the American side >f the Niagara River were getting from the Canadians at the falls horse-power, but the growth of Canadian industries has led to a curtailment of this distribution by quite 60,000 horse-power. It is not alone at Niagara Falls that the drop in the river level makes it possible to usilise the power of the swiftly moving water. From the. footof the falls onward the tide moves with a volume of quite 200,000 cubic feet a, second, and in the course of five miles the level of tlw. stream drops over 100 feet. If the Canadian and the United States Governments cannot agree to a more liberal use of the waters at or above Niagara Falls, the only solution of America’s problem is to utilise the rushing (low below the cataract. Plans have been matured for that purpose, and 1 a projpct nut forward for developing 2.000,000 horse-power at a point a few miles below the cataract. The Niagara River surges northward through a narrow gorge, with flanking hanks, rising from 300 ft to 3ooft above tne stream. At a point called Foster’s flats, however, the hanx slopes easily towards the water, and terminates in a low shelf, which dins far out. thus greatly narrowing the'expanse of fch-. stream’s surface. It is at this point that it is proposed to create a, second falls by means of a dam rising a little more than 100 ft above the present tide level. This would raise the river level, so that there would he a difference or only two feet between the foot of tire falls and the spillway of the dam. The arrangement would in no way interfere with the efficient working of existing plants above the dam. The plan will preserve the falls in their full grandeur; it will create a larger and more imposing whirlpool by adding 50ft to its depth, and it will alter but not obliterate the rapids. .The utilisation of the power of the Niagara River is.not a local concern. At present electrical energy generated at the falls is distributed westward ns far as Detroit, and eastward as far as Syracuse—a total interval of quite 400 miles. The actual maximum length of distribution, taking the falls as a centre, is 250 miles. New York city hc»s within 300 miles of the proposed dam, and it is economically practicable to send current to the metropolis. The amount of energy now used in the empire State is well over 3,000,000 horsepower, and there is an annual increase at the rate of 300,000 horse-power. Power plants already built at Niagara balls represent a total investment of -20,000,000, and because of those hydro-electric stations industrial capital has been drawn to the neighbourhood that probably reaches an aggregate of more than £150.000,000. With an additional 2,000,000 horse-power available manufactories of one sort or another! with a capitalisation several times greater would be attracted to the distribution radius of this energy. To build the dam and to establish the power plants would cost fullv £20.000,000, and the entire project could be brought to completion inside of a period of thre-o years. Because of the physical conditions on the Canadian side at the flats, it will be feasible to build something like 60 per cent of the dam on dry land before interfering in the least with the flow of the stream. When that section of the dam is finished, it will be a comparatively easy matter to divert the waters from the regular river bed. Gradually the enveloping coffer dams will span the gap between the American shore and the outer end of the dam built on dry land. Two million horse-power represents the equivalent consumption of 20,000,000 tons of coal, and America, as every other great industrial country of the world, needp every ton of cpal that can be saved. 1