126 BULLETIN 102, VOL. 1, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



ests of beauty must give place to pressing needs of utility. This 

 consideration alone would not give rise to disfavor in regard to water- 

 power development. The source of disapprobation lies in the lack 

 of vivid appreciation as to the matter of need, coupled with the 

 attendant imputation of surrender to vested interests. Accordingly 

 the water-power situation can not be satisfactorily cleared up until 

 the need for the systematic development of this resource is firmly 

 established; until freight congestions, fireless homes, foodstuff costs, 

 and other intimately personal issues are seen to be genuinely in- 

 volved; until the opportunity for the restrictive furtherance of 

 special interests, financial or sectional, has been eliminated. Until 

 these conditions have been met, attempts to promote the development 

 of our water-power resources are bound to result in ineffectual 

 compromises. 



3. Cost. — A hydroelectric station, once established, is largely self- 

 contained and automatic in operation. There are no periodic items 

 of cost for fuel, for its freightage, haulage, handling, and the like, 

 such as associate themselves with the operation of a steam-power 

 plant. So, apart from such incidentals as administration, insurance, 

 taxes, and depreciation, which together bulk small, practically the 

 whole burden of gross operating expense is that assumed at the 

 outset in the guise of initial cost and perpetuated in the form of 

 interest money.^ 



Thus the cost of money, displaying itself in bond interest, is the 

 determining factor in the cost of hydroelectric power precisely as the 

 price of fuel, with its accompaniment of expense, determines the cost 

 of steam power. The cost of money in this country, on a strictly 

 commercial basis, is high. The prevailing rate of interest demanded 

 of water-power developments is around 7 or 8 per cent, which, with 

 discounts taken into consideration, normally means a demand 

 amounting to 9 or 10 per cent on the working proposition. Esti- 

 mate after estimate the country over has gone to show that only the 



' A unit analy!?is of the gross operating expenses of a typical steam-electric and hydroelectric station of 

 the same capa^^ity (2'l,0t)0 horsepower; annual load factor, 50 per cent; coal, at S?.2.i per ton delivered) is 

 given as follows by Oano Dunn, The water-power situation including its financial aspects, Proc. Amer. 

 Inst. Electr. Eng., May, 1916, p. 585: 



Steam station 

 (per cent of 

 total gross 

 operating 

 expenses). 



Hydroelectric 



station (per 



cent of total 



gross 



operating 



expenses). 



A dministration 



Ordinary operating expenses (except coal) 



Coal 



Taxes and Insurance 



Depreciation 



Bond interest 



Total 



4.0 



10.6 



48.9 



6.7 

 10.8 

 19.0 



4.0 

 4.8 



2.8 



n.o 



77.4 



100.0 



100.0 



