Tesla on Wireless Electric Power

Mr. Nikola Tesla in an interview published Dec. 7 in the New York Press discussed the subject of wireless transmission of electric power. He said that he has worked persistently on the wireless transmission of energy since 1893, when he presented a paper on that subject before the National Electric Light Association in St. Louis and the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia. The popular idea, he said, is that the wireless system of transmission is just one invention, but the fact is that it involves in its present state of perfection six fundamental discoveries, or inventions, in combination. They are as follows:

First. The method and apparatus for transforming ordinary currents into electrical oscillations of great intensity.

Second. The apparatus for intensifying those vibrations immensely, so that they penetrate into the distance.

Third. A receiving apparatus which collects and focuses energy which a transmitter supplies to a large territory. For instance, if such receiver, properly constructed, be placed in Ireland it will collect practically the entire energy conveyed to that country from the transmitter.

Fourth. The method and apparatus for making the electrical impulses secret and non-interferable. That is to say, making it impossible to prevent their passage or to read them. The energy of the transmitter, which is collected by the receiver. only can be released by a sort of safety lock or combination.

Fifth. The production of stationary waves. That is, waves which excite the entire earth and pass through it under a vibration much the same as though you were to draw a string tight and then strike it. With these waves the distance is ab solutely eliminated, as the effects are the same whether the receiver is thousands of miles away or close to the transmitter.

Sixth. A number of inventions which cannot very well be described in a short interview, but which go together to make the system practically operative.

With a plant constructed under the observance of these principles it will, he said, be just as easy to telephone from here to Melbourne, Australia, as across a room, and there will be absolutely no distortion of the voice, such as is observable now in communication by wire. This, he added, is not a theory, but a fact absolutely demonstrated by his experiments, which have shown that the current passes without loss over the entire extent of the globe and through the globe. He has carried the construction of such an installation very far and hopes to be able to complete its construction during the coming summer.

From that moment every telegraphic, telephonic as well as every wireless station will, he said, be ever so much more valuable, as they will be able to receive messages from any part of the world. All this will be done without the slightest change in the existing equipment.

"Will it be necessary under your plan, Mr. Tesla, to build high towers on the shores of the countries using it, and also in interior points?" the inventor was asked.

As to large towers these, he said, are comparatively ineffective. The tower he has built near Port Jefferson, L. I., is only 187 ft. high, but the plant will produce an effect which can be pushed up to a rate of 1,000,000,000 hp, which is more than all the wireless plants that have been put up so far altogether. This enormous activity is secured by the use of certain artifices on which he also bases a confidence that it will be possible to flash signals through interplanetary space.

Mr. Tesla added that his electric power inventions are not altogether his own, and that he has merely laid the foundation. Great work has been done in perfecting the devices by the staff of engineers of the Westinghouse and General Electric companies, so that at present there are hundreds of millions invested in enterprises in which his alternating system forms the underlying foundation. This has harnessed 6,000,000 hp waterfalls.

There are probably enterprises aggregating 20,000,000 more under consideration. The enormous importance of this water power, or the so-called "white coal," can be understood readily when it is borne in mind that I hp for 24 hours is equivalent to the average performance of 24 men. Therefore, the 6,000,000 hp which has been harnessed have virtually added to the world's population from the point of view of labor 144,000,000 of workingmen, who consume no food and need no clothes.

As to power other than that derived from waterfalls, he was happy to say that in this direction also he has been successful, having perfected a new reversible gas turbine of ideal simplicity and beauty, which will permit the harnessing of the waste of the steel and iron furnaces, in which we now are losing in the United States not less than 50,000,000 hp. Mr. Tesla added that he is just about to introduce that invention commercially. As to his wireless system for the transmission of electric power, he said that if it had not been for unfortunate circumstances a plant of this kind would long ago have been in operation. Just one single plant, of, say, 10,000 hp, would be sufficient to drive several thousand flying machines, aeroplanes and dirigibles anywhere in the world. While supplying them with wireless power it also would keep them in constant touch with the earth by wireless telephone and telegraph.

Referring to interplanetary signals, he said he had in his experiments in Colorado discovered certain planetary disturbances, and attained with his transmitter activities which surpassed in power in many ways those of lightning. In his present plant he will be able to reach a rate of energy-delivery of about 1,000,000,000 hp. A simple calculation will, he said, convince any expert that with such an intensity and energy reaching a certain area of the planet Mars, it is ample to produce a perceptible effect in a delicate instrument there.

In answer to a question as to return signals, he said he believed that these signals are being flashed now and waiting for us to answer.