196 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1911. 
can not but strike even the most unobservant. Itis this: When trade 
is good, as it appears to be at present, manufacturers are making 
money; they are overwhelmed with orders, and have no inclination to 
adopt economies which do not appear to them to be essential, and the 
introduction of which would take thought and time, and which would 
withdraw the attention of their employees from the chief object of the 
business—how to make the most of the present opportunities. Hence 
improvements are postponed. When bad times come, then there is no 
money to spend on improvements; they are again postponed until 
better times. arrive. 
What can be done? 
I would answer: Do as other nations have done and are doing; 
take stock annually. The Americans have a permanent commission 
initiated by Mr. Roosevelt, consisting of three representatives from 
each State, the sole object of which is to keep abreast with the diminu- 
tion of the stores of natural energy, and to take steps to lessen its rate. 
This is a nonpolitical undertaking, and one worthy of being initiated by 
the ruler of a great country. If the example is followed here the ques- 
tion will become a national one. 
Two courses are open to us; first, the laissez-faire plan of leaving 
to self-interested competition the combating of waste; or second, 
initiating legislation which, in the interest of the whole nation, will 
endeavor to lessen the squandering of our national resources. This 
legislation may be of two kinds: Penal, that is, imposing a penalty 
on wasteful expenditure of energy supplies; and helpful, that is, 
imparting information as to what can be done, advancing loans at an 
easy rate of interest to enable reforms to be carried out, and insisting 
on the greater prosperity which would result from the use of more 
efficient appliances. 
This is not the place, nor is there the time, to enter into detail; 
the subject is a complicated one, and it will demand the combined 
efforts of experts and legislators for a generation; but if it be not con- 
sidered with the definite intention of immediate action, we shall be held 
up to the deserved execration of our not very remote descendants. 
The two great principles which I have alluded to in an earlier part 
of this address must not, however, be lost sight of; they should guide 
all our efforts to use energy economically. Concentration of energy 
in the form of electric current at high potential makes it possible to 
convey it for long distances through thin and therefore comparatively 
inexpensive wires; and the economic coefficient of the conversion of 
mechanical into electrical and of electrical into mechanical energy is 
a high one; the useless expenditure does not much exceed one-twen- 
tieth part of the energy which can be utilized. These considerations 
would point to the conversion at the pit mouth of the energy of the fuel 
into electrical energy, using as an intermediary turbines, or preferably 
