NEW ZEALAND’S COAL.
ONLY ONE ErXTVRED YEARS’ SUPPLY. The coal supplies in New Zealand are j Riven a term of only one hundred years | hy Air It. Speight, curator of Uanterj bury Aliiseum. “In fifty years.” lie ! said at the annual meetiiiß of the Canierbnry Philosophical Institute last nißlu, “ we shall he permanently short ot coal. Jhe waste at our coai mines is eontimious, and is on a very large scale. At Avoea. Broken River, linndieds nt ions ol small coal are stacked up and are being washed away hy Sloven’s (..reek and discharged into Broken River. This coal is being lost in j exactly t-ho same way as the coal mea- ■ sores were stripped from the mountains ]hy 1 rust, snow and other agencies. I.l’s j a shame that we should lose all that material. It is important that our coal | mines should he properly surveyed anrl that the coal should lie won hy scientific methods that will avoid waste. 1 think that people in this country do not ! milise how their heritage is being lost j h\ toe waste that is going on in conI nection with the eoal mines. lam not j an engineer, hut it seems to me to be i quite possible, and eortafnlv very pro--1 litahlc. to turn the eoal 'at Broken i River into available energy on the spot | and so avoid the great waste in transit. I I'.tcry time the trucks are emptied a large quantity of eoal is lost. Bv est'.ililidimg electrical works the coal j could he turned into energy at the i mints, and the serious waste would he restricted. _ Every country in the world, I even the Ini ted States, which has enormous reserves, is considering very sori- ! oiwly tlie profitable utilisation of its j coal, and New Zealand, which has very i small reserves, is doing nothing to make | her already limited supplies last ns long j | as possible.” I ] .Mr Speight, who was reading a paper ; on t he" geological features of the coal 1 area a! Broken River, said that New | Zealand’s coal supplies would be worki cd out, in the Ended Stares in eighteen j months. r
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/TS19191204.2.17
Bibliographic details
Star (Christchurch), Issue 19814, 4 December 1919, Page 3
Word Count
363NEW ZEALAND’S COAL. Star (Christchurch), Issue 19814, 4 December 1919, Page 3
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