8j6 report— 1892. 



and Liverpool by pressure water, and that by compressed air in Paris, shows how 

 lapidlj', when power is available, a demand for it arises. A striking instance may 

 be found in the small town of Geneva. 



In 1871, soon after the completion of the earlier system of low-pressure water 

 supply, Col. Turrettiui applied to the municipal council to place a pressure eno^ine 

 on the town mains for driving the iactory of the Society for Manufacturing Physi- 

 cal Instruments. The plan proved so convenient that nine years after, in 1S80, 

 there were in Geneva 111 water-motors supplied from the low pressure mains, 

 using 34,000,000 cubic feet of water annually, and paying to the municipality 

 nearly 2,000/. a year. The cost of the pov-fer was not low. It was charged at a 

 rate equivalent to from 36Z. to 48/. per horse-power per year of 3,000 worhing 

 hours. But even the hijih price did not prevent the use of power so conveniently 

 obtainable. 



Since then a high-pressure water service has been established, the water being 

 pumped by turbines in the Phone. From this high-pressure service power is 

 su])plied more cheaply. On the high-pressure system the cost of the power is 

 about O'ld. per horse-power hour, or 81. per horse-power for 3,000 working hours. 



In 1889 the annual income from water sold for power purposes on the low- 

 pressure system was 2,085/., and on the high-pressure system 4,500/. On the high- 

 pressure system the receipts in 1889 were increasing at the rate of 880/. per year. 



In 1889 the motive power distributed, on the high-pressure system alone, 

 amounted to 1 ,.500,000 horse-power hours, there being seventy-nine motors of aa 

 aggregate working power of 1,279 horses. 



In Zurich there is a quite similar system and power, amounting to 9,000,000 

 horse-power hours in the year, distributed hydraulically to various consumers, 

 who pay a rental of 1,200/. per ajiuum. It will be noted that all this power in 

 Geneva and Zurich is obtained from water which has been pumped, and it is the 

 low cost of the water-power which does the pumping which makes this possible. 



But, further, in both Geneva and Zurich the whole of the dynamos supplying 

 electric light are also driven by turbines using pumped water. The convenience 

 of this arises in this way. The fall obtainable in the river in both cases is a small 

 one, and varies. Large turbines are required, and these cannot work at a constant 

 speed. Further, it is expensive to use 'these large low-pressure turbines to drive 

 directly dynamos which only work with a considerable load for a short portion of 

 the day. The low-pressure turbines in the river are therefore used to pump water 

 to a high-level reservoir, and they work with a constant load all the twenty-four 

 hours. 



From the high-level reservoir water is taken as power is required to drive 

 the dynamos, and the turbines driving the dynamos are small high-pressure tur- 

 bines, working always on a constant iall at a regular speed, and easily adjusted by 

 a governor to a varying load. The system seems a roundabout one, but it is per- 

 fectly rational, eflective, and economical. 



Few persons can have seen Niagara Falls without reflecting on the enormous 

 energy which is there continuously expended, and for any useful purpose wasted. 

 The exceptional constancy of the volume of flow, the invariability of the levels, the 

 depth of the plunge over the escarpment, the solid character of the rocks, all mark 

 out Niagara as an ideally perfect water-power station, while, on the other hand, 

 the remarkable facilities of transport, both by steam navigation on the lakes and 

 by four systems of railway, afford commercial advantages of the highest importance. 

 I'rom a catchment basin of 240,000 square miles, an area greater than that of 

 France, a volume of water amounting to 205,000 cubic feet per second descends 

 from Lake Erie to Lake Ontario, a vertical distance of 326 feet, in 37^ miles. 



Supposing the whole stream could be utilised, it would supply 7,000,000 hor.se- 

 power. This is more than dotxble the total steam and water power at present 

 employed in manufacturing industry in the United States. 



Immediately below the Falls the river bends at right angles, and flows through 

 a narrow sorge. The town of Niagara Falls on the American side occupies the 

 table-land in this angle. 



The earliest traders who settled near the Falls erected stream mills in the 



