Hitching Lightning

New York to Be Run by Electricity Before Long.

NIKOLA TESLA ON THE SCENT

225,000 Horse Power in Waste Falling Water Near The City.

When Long Distance Transmission of the Current Without Loss Is an Assured Fact, and It Will Be Soon, Horses Won't Be of so Much Use, and Steam Will Not Be Needed.

If Nikola Tesla's scheme for the transmission of the electric current over long distances, without appreciable loss of energy, through the medium of a mineral fluid, inclosed in a metallic pipe, proves as successful as he and his friends believe it will, then a revolution is indeed at hand.

For then, before many years have rolled away, the power furnished by falling water will not only be hauling boats along the Erie Canal, turning the wheels of industry in Buffalo and other up-State cities and lighting the paths of their inhabitants by night, but there is no reason whatever to doubt this-it will not be long before imperial New York will be served with the same sort of power and in the same way.

It will be one of the most astonishing of modern material miracles, this hauling cars up and down the streets of the New World's metropolitan city; this discarding of the power of steam that has reigned for so many years in this bustling, hustling, noisy town, by the might of water that is falling over precipices many miles away. According to Mr. Frank W. Hawley, vice president of the Cataract General Electric Company, this miracle will assuredly be wrought, just as soon after the practical utility of Tesla's invention has been fully demonstrated, as it is possible to erect the poles and string the strange conduit through which the magic current is to convey Niagara's force.

This is not all, however. Not all of Niagara's water can be used to make power, and of that part which is available, a portion is already pledged to Buffalo, a portion will be required to drag boats through the waters of the canal, the power of many horses will be required on the Niagara Falls branch of the Central-Hudson Railroad, and other portions will be used at Rochester, Syracuse, Utica and elsewhere. But after all these demands have been satisfied there will be an enormous surplus, and this surplus will be offered to New York. residents of this city sometimes forget it, but more power is consumed within a radius of fifteen miles of New York's City Hall than in the fourteen of fifteen next largest cities in all America, Manhattan Island alone is the greatest power user in the world, with two or three exceptions, its needs being so great indeed that all the surplus power of Niagara would not supply it. This statement is made on the authority of Mr. Hawley and of Hon. C. P. Vedder, general manager of the Cataract General Electric Company, two gentlemen who have made a most exhaustive study of the whole matter.

GREAT WATER POWER NEAR NEW YORK.

With all this in mind, the writer of this article asked these gentlemen yesterday whether the Cataract General Electric Company had taken any steps to secure any rights in the magnificent water powers known to exist much nearer New York than Niagara, in Northern New Jersey and Southeastern New York particularly. To this question both declined to give satisfactory answers, but it is well known and a matter of record that the water supplies and waterfalls of what is known as the highland region of the State across the Hudson are already pre-empted. Further. it is understood among those likely to be interested in that direction, that several choice sites for possible power development in the Catskills and Adirondacks have changed hands within a comparatively short time, and there are many who believe that the organization with which Mr. Vedder and Mr. Hawley are connected is at the bottom of it all, with the intention of electrically supplying this big town with as much hydraulic power as can be furnished. If it be true that the Cataract General Electric people have secured control of most of the available powers near New York not already in use, then certain other capitalists will be greatly disappointed, for it is within the knowledge of the writer that searches for such power were energetically begun some years ago by several different groups of men not entirely disconnected with the trolley railroad developments of the day, and who had planned to utilize the waterfalls of Northern New Jersey in the propulsion of street cars, not only on Manhattan Island, but also upon various lines on the mainland.

The proposed use of hydraulically generated electricity by the Cataract General Electric Company is, however, much broader than that contemplated by the gentlemen indicated. It includes the running of factories, the elevators and the printing presses, as well as running the trolley cars; it takes in the lighting of the streets, the homes and the business places of the town; It includes heating all sorts of structures and the cooking of food; the furnishing of current to the telephone exchanges, to the telegraph companies and to whoever can make use of developed energy in any form whatsoever.

NEW JERSEY WATER POWER.

According to the report of the Geological Survey of the State of New Jersey, It would be possible to develop horse power for twelve hours a day from falling water in estate, and within forty miles of the metropolis. In order to do this, however. three conditions would be necessary. First, twelve inches yearly rainfall; second, large and expensive storage reservoirs; third, the privilege of using all the water and all the fall. The first two conditions are not at all Impossible. The average annual rainfall of Northern New Jersey exceeds twelve inches in fact, and there is no doubt whatever that money to build the storage reservoirs would be forthcoming at once were it known with a reasonable degree of certainty that the enterprise would be a profitable one. But the third condition cannot well be realized. Most, if not all, of the available water supplies in the region named are already controlled by the West Milford Storage Water Company and the East Jersey Water Company, but these companies were organized and are pledged to supply the water to which they have acquired the rights to Newark and other cities for domestic and municipal uses. Still, as the highest points in Newark, Elizabeth, Jersey City, Hoboken and other cities cannot be much more than 200 feet above sea level, there is a goodly amount of fall unutilized by the cities between the sources of supply at Greenwood Lake, Lake Hopatcong, Lake Denmark, the Pequonnock watershed, etc., in the so-called Highland region

 According to the report of the Geological Survey, the Passaic and its branches fall 152 feet between Little Falls and Dundee Falls, forty feet of this fall being within the distance of one mile, seventy at Paterson and twenty-one at Dundee dam. Already nearly 5,000 horse power is developed at the points mentioned, but, according to the official figures, this is only a fraction of what could be utilized. This is figured at 224,159 horse power for twelve hours a day, so that, according to the report of the Geological Survey, there is now running to waste 219,000 horse power in that region alone, or was before any part of the water flowing into the Passaic had been diverted for municipal uses. It must be understood, of course, that this power could not be made available without the erection of extensive storage dams and other costly works.

On the Rockaway at Boonton there is already some development, but not nearly to the limit, for the watershed includes 1,489 square miles and there is an available fall of 280 feet in two miles. If storage works were built so as to utilize an annual fall of twelve inches, a power of 8,379 horses could be developed there.

The waters of the Pequonnock watershed, seventy square miles in extent, fall 500 feet in the nine miles between Charlottesburg and Pompton, and with storage for twelve inches annual flow, 7,038 horse power could be realized at the latter place. Much of this water is now served to the city of Newark, but there is a big fall between the reservoirs of the East Jersey Water Company and the level of Newark's distributing reservoirs, and there is no apparent reason why a part of this now wasted fall could not be used for power purposes without detriment to Newark. To these noble powers should be added those available in the Highland region, some 700 square miles in extent, and including Greenwood Lake. The average fall of the stream flowing from this region, which is remarkable for the massing of its power at certain points, and these mostly on the eastern border and so nearest New York, is 200 feet. Properly stored so as to conserve an annual rain fall of twelve inches, the available water power would amount to 29,152 horse power.

225,000 HORSE POWER AVAILABLE.

The four amounts, as calculated in the report of the Geological Survey, thus recapitulated, make up the stated total of 268,728 horse power, but according to the figuring of interested parties, it would not be safe, after deducting the amount of water likely to be required for local and municipal use, to count on more than 75,000 horse power as available for transmission to New York. In the Adirondacks and the Catskills, however, which have been just as carefully examined with reference to water power possibilities, it is computed that at least 150,000 horse power can be obtained, and that without the building of any great amount of storage work. One hundred thousand horse power, Indeed, can be obtained from the Adirondacks alone, without any storage works at all, by simply utilizing the natural flow of the streams, their natural fall and the natural storage of the lakes.

But 225,000 horse power would not be enough to supply the city of New York at the present time, let alone the sister city of Brooklyn, across the Bridge. It is not easy accurately to compute the power used by a great city like this metropolis, but figures which give an approximate notion thereof have been compiled by the writer with the help of various persons in a position to have the facts in their possession. This table indicates, in part, the power consumption in New York:

Deducting the licensed horses which cannot well be displaced by electricity and the power developed by the elevated roads, since it has been decided that the structure is too weak to bear the weight of electrical motors, there is a remainder of 227,000 horse power. But it is conceivable that the new Lamb motor, to be used in towing boats upon the canal and the only motor whose traction power does not depend upon its weight, may furnish the solution for the problem of electric traction upon the "L" roads. It is understood, as this motor can go up any grade, no matter how steep, and can even mount a vertical cableway. that it may be used for passenger transportation in the Adirondack and other mountain regions where it has heretofore been impossible to build railroads. But that's another matter.

The 227,000 horse power shown in the table is by no means all that New York can make use of and does make use of already. The electric lights are furnished by power included in the stationary engine item, but no notice is taken of the immense amount of steam used for heating purposes, which is practically equivalent to horse power and may be displaced electricity, or of power used upon the docks, or of the power used by the Central-Hudson and the consolidated railroads on Manhattan Island, nor that developed by the electric and other railroads within the city limits north of the Harlem River, or of many other causes of power consumption not here enumerated. Everything considered, it is not an extravagant estimate to place the total of the power used here at half a million horse power, and then no account has been taken of the power used in running the Brooklyn Bridge or of that consumed by the city at the far end of the Bridge and elsewhere within easy reach of a power distributing station located somewhere on this island.

WHAT IT WILL MEAN.

Unless one has thought a good deal upon this matter, he has no idea of what a revolution the introduction of hydraulically generated, electrically transmitted power will work, when the system is put into operation. It will do away with puffing engines and clouds of steam and the danger of black, light-destroying smoke from soft coal, a danger that is not the less real because, so far, New York has managed to limit the coal consumption to anthracite. It will take out of the atmosphere the millions upon millions of particles of fine, impalpable dust, generated from the burning of the anthracite, that menace comfort, clothing and even health and life. Further, it will add acres and acres to the available space for doing business on this congested island, for the motors will occupy but a fraction of the space now taken up by the engines and boilers and storage room for coal will decrease in exact ratio with the increase of electrical consumption. of course the coal business will suffer a frightful reduction, if the electric current once gets in here, especially if it can be made available at economical rates for heating purposes, but no great stride forward in material improvement was ever taken without doing injury to some interests.

How much will it cost to put in the needed water storage reservoirs and the wheels and lay the conduits to this town? That's a hard question to answer. But it will be millions, and that fact is of itself a guarantee that the change will not be made until the power can be furnished at materially lower rates than steam power can be made, for it will cost other millions for the users of steam power to discard their engines and boilers and they will never do that until they are sure they can make big savings thereby.

Will it be possible to supply New York with all the water-made electric power it wants? That's another hard question, but those who are figuring on the problem think that it will, for the power sources mentioned in this article form only a small proportion of those within practical reach of the metropolis. A bill has recently passed the Legislature for the construction of a great storage reservoir on the upper Genesee, and although its purpose is to supply water to the canal and the city of Rochester, the great fall between Portage gorge, where the dam is to be built and the level of velhof Rochester, can be utilized to make power without Injury to the dam as a storage reservoir. Besides, there are uncalculated hundreds of thousands of water horse power running to waste every day in the year various parts of New England, New York and Pennsylvania, which could be called upon in case of need. Furthermore, there are men at work to-day on the problem of utilizing the almost immeasurable power that goes to waste daily in the tides.