CHAS. E. FOWLER. 277 



system. In this instance "salt is added to water at 

 the rate of 16 pounds per 100 gallons. The brine thas 

 formed is electrolized and the decomposed product is 

 discharged directly into the sewer. 



The operation is performed in a wooden tank inside 

 a small building. The current from a small dynamo 

 passes through a positive electrode of copper, plated with 

 platinum, and a negative electrode of carbon, both im- 

 mersed in a tank." The outlet sewer discharges into 

 trenches excavated in a meadow near the river. The 

 object of this process was to disinfect the sewage, and 

 it is said that both chemical and biological examinations 

 indicated most satisfactory results. This process was 

 subsequently, in 1898, applied to the water of the Croton 

 itself at this point, by increasing the capacity of the pre- 

 vious plant, and using a 3r«' solution of salt and water for 

 the purpose, the electrolized solution being discharged 

 into the stream through a perforated pipe extending 

 across the river. 



I have seen no statement of the efficiency of this latter 

 application of this process. Dr. T. M. Drown, in a 

 paper read before the N. Y. Water Works Association 

 in 1894, says of it. "The so-called electricial purification 

 of water by treating it with an electrolized solution of 

 salt is simply a process of disinfection by sodium hypo- 

 chlorite ; electricity, as such, has nothing to do with it. 

 There is nothing peculiar in the sodium hypochlorite 

 produced by electrolysis ; it has no different properties 

 from that made by the ordinary process of passing chlo- 

 rine into a solution of caustic soda." Dr^ Drown 

 further says: " In cases where a water supply is in such 

 a hoplessly bad condition that nothing will render it safe 

 but disinfection by chloride of soda or chloride of lime, 

 it is high time, I think, to abandon the supply." 



Several other attempts have been made to apply 

 electricity to the pariftcation of water, both in England 



215 



