i'io8 WASTE OF NATURAL RESOURCJ 



is organized to further legislation equal How and a required depth 



whereby the large area of swamp land navigation, and furnishing an assured 



in the United States may be drained supply for power plants, municipal 



and reclaimed under the supervision purposes and irrigation, as well 



of the Reclamation Service. The aver- preventing Iloods and drought-, 



age cost of draining the swamp lands There is an enormous and dan. 



is $5 an acre; and the 80,000,000 ous waste in the using of our mineral 



acres of these lands, in the various fuel resources. 



States from Maine to California, if For instance, the railroads annually 

 drained, would furnish homes of 100 burn 150,000,000 tons of coal, of which 

 acres each for 800,000 families, or only 5 per cent of the potential power 

 some 4,000,000 people; or farms of residing in the coal is actually used; 

 20 acres each for 4,000,000 families, the other 95 per cent, being lost by 

 making 20,000,000 people. wasteful mechanical methods. In the 

 In appointing the Inland Water- best incandescent electric lighting 

 ways Commission, the President plants one one-fifth of I per cent of 

 planned for a comprehensive study of the potential power in the coal can, 

 the vast inland chain of rivers and under our present methods, be o '11- 

 lakes, with a view of developing and verted into light. 



utilizing these great waterways, thus If the rate of consumption of coal 

 opening the channels of trade and ex- continues to increase hercaftrr as it 

 tending commerce in some forty of has increased in the last ninety years. 

 our richest and most prosperous and there is reason to believe that it 

 States. A fourteen foot channel, as will do so. the anthracite coal will last 

 proposed, from the Gulf to the Great about fifty years,' and the bitumin 

 Lakes, would relieve the railway con- coal a little over 100 year 

 gestion, by taking over the bulky and The consumption of coal by dec- 

 non-perishable commodities of freight, ades is as follows : 

 and open the way for the fullest utili- SHORT TONS 

 zation of the benefits of the Panama 18161018'" 



Ca "r L 1 826 to 1 835 4,168. 



We speak of the mineral wealth of T Q->tr> ,x ''- TTT/ >- 



, -IT r T-, < ,1 , loxo to lo4S 2x,l//,Ox> 



the West. But the gold, the silver, 



, ,, ,, , s , ,, . . ' 1040 to ios- 3>4 I > 2 5 



\ o the products of the mines in l8 ^ to l86s 173795014 



the Rocky Mountains do not. equal in l8 6 6to lg 419^25 104 



value the waters flowing from those ]8 6to l8g : ^. 



mountains, and practically all unused. ]8g6 tQ lg ^ 



Running to waste over Government l8 o 6toll 



dams, year after year, are 1,600,000 



horse power, one of our greatest Na- \- shown by the above figures the 



tional assets. amount consumed in any one 



Not being controlled, the water is is eiual to the entire ; 



free to come down in the wet seasons sumption. Thi^ rate, if continu 



in floods. The damage from floods in m> -i increased consumption 'hat 



the country is over a hundred million no -npply. however s^reat. ran with- 



dollars- a year. We shall have reached stand 



the ideal condition when we manage Th. d in the 



and control our rivers and streams as a '1 Stai 



city manages its water mains and hy- 20 This am<>unt 



drants ; when, at the head-waters of would form -i and a half 



our navigable streams are reservoirs of miles- hi^li. seven ard a half nv 



sufficient capacity to hold all the wa- long, and .md a half mi' d; 



ters of the severest floods, so that we or it would form a layer of coa! sj x 



can shut off or let on at will any vol- and a hah" feet thick over the entire 



nine of water, thus maintaining an area of the coal fields of the UIT 



