The total capacity of plant installed by companies and municipalities
was, so far as could be definitely ascertained, 2,546,000 K.W.
in 1920, with a load connected (equivalent 30-watt lamps) of
144,274,800, and an aggregate maximum load of 1,372,548 K.W.
The Board of Trade units of electricity are recorded for 1920 as
3,086,382,748, and in 1910 as 1,027,420,254.
Further information on the above subjects may be gathered from the following publications: “Electric Power Supply during the Great War” (Part I.) by (Sir) A. B. Gridley and A. H. Human (Jour. Inst. Elec. Engrs., vol. lvii., No. 282, May 1919); Interim Report of the Coal Conservation Sub-Committee of the Reconstruction Committee on Electric Power Supply in Great Britain (Cd. 8,880); Report of the Board of Trade Committee on the Electrical Trades after the War (Cd. 9.072); Report of the Board of Trade Committee on Electric Power Supply (Cd. 9.062); Report of the Committee of Chairmen of the Advisory Council of the Ministry of Reconstruction on Electric Power Supply (Cd. 93); The Manual of Electrical Undertakings, vols. xiii-xxiv.
- (A. G. W.)
United States.—The decade 1910-20, perhaps not so rich as its predecessor in fundamental electrical invention, showed so greatly increased a demand for electric current that much effort was applied to improving methods of production and supply. In many sections of the country all sources of water-power nearby were already employed so that it was necessary to transmit power two and three hundred miles. The highest voltages used in 1910 would be too low to be economical for such distances; during 1910-20 the use of transmission voltages in excess of 100,000 became fairly common; in 1921 220,000-volt lines were being completed. Larger generating units also became necessary. There were in operation in 1921 35,000-K.W. water-wheel units, and 50,000-K.W. units were to be used in Canada in 1922. Steam turbines of the multiple-unit type as large as 72,000 H.P. were operating in New York City and single-unit types up to 35,000 H.P. were operating successfully.
Because of the better light and smaller consumption of the tungsten lamp, which was made practicable by the discovery of a process for drawing tungsten wire, the demand for electric current grew rapidly. This lamp, by using less current, reduced the expenditure of every establishment using electric light, and it became necessary to develop a commercial organization to sell service. By 1921 virtually every electric light and power company maintained a selling organization. Much of the new demand was due to the war. The orders of the Allies for munitions in and after 1915 found the factories of North America ill-equipped to undertake so sudden an increase of production. It was quicker to buy electric power than to procure and install additional generating equipment. Then, later, a serious coal shortage made it apparent throughout the country that a central power-distributing organization was more economical and reliable than a number of small isolated plants. Added to the industrial demand thus suddenly thrust upon the power companies came a heavy demand from households for current for appliances. Domestics had been enticed from service by the munitions plants and electric labour-saving devices replaced them.
There were in 1921 nearly 7,000,000 homes in the United States wired for electric service, served by 5,600 electric light and power companies, the output of which for that year was expected to be about 42,000,000,000 K.W.-hours. From the sale of this current $1,050,000,000 would be obtained. The capital invested in these plants then amounted in round numbers to $4,500,000,000. The growth of retail outlets per capita for electrical merchandise increased nearly 400% during 1910-20, and the output of central power plants nearly 300%.
In spite of the lower consumption of current by the tungsten lamp the prices for electric current decreased steadily until 1916, when higher wages and costs of materials offset economies of efficient operation. About that time a number of supply companies initiated what is known as the “coal clause” in their contracts with consumers, under which the rate varied in a fixed ratio to the fluctuating price of coal. By the end of 1921, however, these clauses had begun to disappear. Household rates were not raised during the war, but later there were many increases. There was some urging of the London sliding scale of rates but in 1921 only two or three companies were using it. In fact, while during the first ten years of the century a great variety of rate-schedules was proposed and put into use, the second decade was free, comparatively, from such activity except perhaps for a form of household schedule which based the rate on the number and type of rooms plus a charge for current.
State regulation, which had appeared in a few states before 1910, by 1921 was found in nearly all states, and any attempt to substitute local regulation was opposed bitterly by the power companies. State regulation did more than anything else to free electricity supply from political interference. As a result term franchises were fast disappearing and were being replaced by indeterminate franchises.
No review of the decade's progress of electricity supply would be complete without reference to the great expansion of syndicate operation and management. Through the control by one company, usually known as a holding company, of numerous properties, a great saving was made. Central organizations have applied to small properties better engineering and management than they otherwise could have had. This also resulted in the discontinuance of small uneconomical plants and the substitution of large unified systems supplying many communities.
The advantages derived from unified systems became so significant that “super-power” projects began to be agitated. The United States Government became interested and an appropriation was made for an investigation of the power resources of the industrial region of the Atlantic seaboard, from Washington to Boston, under the auspices of the U.S. Geological Survey. This report was not yet published in Oct. 1921. It was known, however, that a vast network fed by a number of “super-power” plants would be recommended. Other surveys were being made by those locally interested in the South and in the North-West.
A little more than half of the current sold by power companies in the United States is generated by water-power. The development of the water-power resources of the country, however, was greatly retarded during 1910-720 by the threat of unfavourable Federal legislation. Congress considered for twelve years a water-power bill which was finally passed in 1920. Since its passage there has been a water-power stampede similar in many ways to the 1849 gold stampede to California. Applications were on file in 1921 for more than 51,000,000 H.P. and preliminary permits and licences had been granted to develop 2,255,696 H.P. The bill creates a Federal water-power commission, comprising three cabinet officers, the Secretaries of War, Agriculture and the Interior, to which is given authority over all matters over which the Federal Government has jurisdiction, pertaining to the development of water-powers in navigable streams, on the public domain and in the national forests.
The features of the bill are: (1) the erection of a commission (The Federal Power Commission); (2) the granting of a 50-year lease; and (3) the ability of the Government to resume control of the project on the payment of just compensation at the termination of the lease. Priority is given to national, state and municipal governments. On the Colorado river alone one company was planning to develop between three and four million H.P. of electrical energy.
In order further to assure continuity and reliability of central service, and also to make certain economies possible, the interconnexion of large power systems was introduced. One such system extends along the Gulf states, from Alabama to Georgia, through the Carolinas and into Tennessee. Another interconnects most of the important New England systems, and a third covers the great industrial region of Pennsylvania. California is connected from end to end, and the Rocky Mountain states are similarly linked. In addition there are other important but less extensive interconnexions; it would be possible by spanning a few gaps to interconnect almost the whole country.
Embraced in these interconnexions are certain large industrial plants. They interchange current with the public utilities under an arrangement beneficial to both. The tendency, however, is unmistakably toward service of all manufacturing plants by central stations. The only reason this has not gone further is that the power companies during 1915-21 were generating to their full capacity.
A survey made by the Electrical World of New York City shows that in 1920 there were 326,840 consumers of electric power in the United States. These were divided by sections as follows: New England, 35,300; Middle Atlantic, 50,950; South Atlantic, 19,200; North Central, 133,730; South Central, 22,370; Mountain, 10,690; and Pacific, 54,600.
Seventy-one central power companies had in 1921 an output of more than a hundred million K.W.-hrs. and nine in excess of a thousand million K.W.-hours. The three companies having the largest output were in 1920 the Niagara Falls (N.Y.) Power Co., 2,328,326,064 K.W.-hrs.; the Commonwealth Edison Co., Chicago, Ill., 1,883,570,000 K.W.-hrs.; and the Pacific Gas & Electric Co., San Francisco, Cal., 1,475,678,673 K.W.-hrs.
Municipal ownership sustained a great setback during the war because high costs of production added too much to city budgets. As a result a great many municipal plants went out of existence, their service being replaced by that of large transmission systems. Just before the war, however, there were some important additions to municipal operation, particularly in California and Ohio.
Another activity curtailed by the war was the organized sale of electric ranges. The provision by central stations of current for cooking before the war was becoming extremely important. Many cities had established a special range rate as low as 3 cents per K.W.-hour. High first cost, however, interrupted this activity, but in 1921 it seemed to be reviving. The practice in street lighting had been that the public utility service should own and maintain the lighting
