Industrial Research 



65 



Consolidated Edison Company 

 of New York, Incorporated 



Public utilities providing electric, gas, or steam 

 service are faced with research problems that are dif- 

 ferent in many ways from those of manufacturing com- 

 panies. They do not usually manufacture or sell 

 products and are not directly interested in creating new 

 products. Their function is to provide service at the 

 least possible cost to the public. To a very consider- 

 able degree, the plant and facilities of a utility company 

 are composed of more or less complete units purchased 

 from manufacturers. The engineering problems are, 

 therefore, largely those of selecting suitable equipment 

 and assembling it in a way that will give the most 

 effective operation. Only to a limited extent does the 

 company fabricate raw materials. 



Manj' of the items of equipment, however, are such 

 that they cannot be tested thoroughly by the manufac- 

 turer. Large steam turbine generating units, electric 

 power cables, large gas manufacturing equipment must 

 be operated under service conditions in order to deter- 

 mine their limitations and possibilities. Therefore, the 

 chief tasks of research workers in the utility industry 

 are the critical examination of problems arising from 

 the operation of equipment and the interpretation of 

 the results of such an examination in ways that will be 

 useful in designing and manufacturing equipment. The 

 utilities rarely make basic designs for such equipment, 

 however, but are continually confronted with the prob- 

 lem of choosing between a number of designs ofl'ered by 

 various manufacturers. An intelligent choice requires 

 knowledge of the controlling factors. Occasionally it 

 is necessary for the utility companies, as purchasers of 

 equipment, to make demands that will accelerate prog- 

 ress, but these can be made intelligently only when 

 those calling for the new type of equipment have a suf- 

 ficiently detailed understanding of the problems in- 

 volved to know that their solution is practical and eco- 

 nomically sound. 



Other research arises in connection with the adapt- 

 ing of utility company services to the needs of custo- 

 mers. Most of the activity in this connection is of an 

 engineering or teclmical nature, but there is a continual 

 sprinkling of problems, such as corrosion of pipes and 

 equipment utilizing gas or steam, which demand the 

 more fundamental approach that can be made only by 

 a research organization. 



The Consolidated Edison Company of New York is 

 one of the few utilities in the country that has set up 

 research as a distinct activity. In most companies it 

 is a part of the engineering and operating divisions. The 

 present research organization of this companj' is an out- 

 growth of the work of a small group formed in 1922 and 

 charged with the responsibility of handling a variety of 

 technical problems in connection with high voltage elec- 



tric power cables on the new power transmission system 

 which was then being evolved. An important phase of 

 the early work was the development of new test tech- 

 niques for use in the investigation of the cables and the 

 making of suitable joint designs. This effort was grad- 

 ually expanded to include methods for checking new in- 

 stallations of cable and for locating faults when they 

 occurred. Gradually these procedures became more or 

 less routine and were eventually transferred to the 

 company's testing and operating departments. 



For 15 years electrical msulation has been an impor- 

 tant study m the company's laboratory. Today, atten- 

 tion is directed particularly to the factors influencing 

 the deterioration of electrical insulation and to the es- 

 tablishment of criteria for use by the engineering depart- 

 ments in their selection of cables. Many aspects of this 

 work are so fundamental that a study of them requires 

 men with a knowledge of physical chemistry and physics. 



Improved efficiencies in the utilization of fuel have 

 been possible only through the extensive use of new 

 products of the metallurgical industry; consequently 

 work in metallurgy has been of growing importance. 

 Although the materials which are used in the production 

 and fabrication of metals are carefully selected, they 

 must be put into actual service before their essential 

 characteristics can be determined. The company has, 

 therefore, found it very important to have in its research 

 organization trained metallurgists, as only they can 

 obtain the necessary fundamental information. Ex- 

 tensive laboratory studies are frequently required to 

 explain conditions observed in the field. 



The personnel of the research organization in the Con- 

 solidated Edison Company, totaling about 30, is not 

 large, but the assistance of a large technical service 

 organization and of the engineering departments is 

 available whenever specific projects demand an in- 

 creased personnel. 



Eastman Kodak Company 



While still a bank clerk, George Eastman began the 

 research which laid the foundation for the present 

 Eastman Kodak Company. Keenly interested in 

 photography, he was annoyed at having to carry about a 

 dark tent and silver bath whenever he wished to take a 

 picture, and when an article in an English journal 

 suggested to him a possible improvement in the art, he 

 set about "to compose an emulsion that could be coated 

 and dried on a glass plate and retain its properties long 

 enough to be used in the field." His first experiments 

 brought small results, but finally he found a coating of 

 gelatin and silver that had all the necessary photo- 

 graphic qualities. 



The thought then came to him that other photog- 

 raphers must also be eager to rid themselves of the 

 cumbersome equipment required for taking pictures. 



