SECTION G.— ENGINEERING. 



THE PRESENT AND FUTURE 

 DEVELOPMENT OF ELECTRICITY 



SUPPLY. 



ADDRESS BY 



SIR JOHN F. C. SNELL, G.B.E., M.Ikst.C.E., 



PRESIDENT OF THE SECTION. 



The rapid and almost universal development of electricity affords an 

 example of the practical application of a great source of power in nature 

 to the use and convenience of mankind with which there is no parallel. 

 In telegraphy, telephony, telephotography, and especially in wireless 

 telegraphy, the effects on humanity have been incalculable. Wireless 

 telegraphy especially adds nowadays to the amenities of life, whether 

 broadcasting world news, weather forecasts, music or educational addresses. 

 It enables commimication to be effected between, and the safe direction 

 of, ships at sea in fog and all weathers, and the direction of aeroplanes 

 and dirigibles in fog or at night, and it thus greatly lessens the risks of 

 those who go down to the sea in ships or who travel by air. 



The jubilee of the telephone was celebrated only a few weeks ago, 

 and wireless telegraphy has come into prominence within recent years. 



The aid to the surgeon and the electrical treatment of various diseases 

 have enormously reduced human suffering ; the investigations and researches 

 of J. J. Thomson, Ernest Rutherford, and others have thrown a new and 

 vivid light upon our conception of the structure of matter, and have aided 

 the knowledge and researches of both the physicist and the chemist. 

 Finally, in the almost universal application to all kinds of mechanical 

 requirements — ranging from 100,000 kw. turbine generators or heavy 

 freight locomotives at one end of the scale to motor-driven sewing-machines 

 or vacuum cleaners at the other end — the advance it may simply be said 

 has been remarkable. 



Is there any other known form of energy which can be so readily and 

 generally applied to large and small power, chemical and metallurgical 

 processes, the production of light in various forms, or to all sorts of heating 

 appliances, surgical and dental implements and laboratory instruments 

 of the highest attainable degree of accuracy — in short, capable of almost 

 universal application to all kinds of tools and transformation into various 

 kinds of energy ? 



The development of electricity supply as a necessary agent in the 

 progress of civilisation has been accomplished within a very few years, 

 for there was no general supply available in any part of the world prior 



