Show increasing hydroelectric demands BY LETSON BALLIET E R M AND C E X more hydroelectric energy must be developed ve loped there is a fast growing industrial demand the available energy from present sources is insufficient for present demands industrial progress is retarded and prevented by lack of power when any individual or corporation starts into business or extends a branch to a new location whether it be a bank a grocery a factory a railroad or a power company it asks and decides one question viz can patronage be built up to support it notice please the words built up no one expects to find a completely paying business already existing but with the power business there are many industries that cannot be started until the power is first available when once a power company enters a field or community it has generally figured a big excess of capacity over its visible possibilities for power uses knowing that the ingenious brains of hundreds of indus trial pro promoters motors will devise schemes for the use of power beyond the conception of the present the very fact that energy is available brings pro promoters motors from afar to plan industries under the transmission lines the proper power facilities bring brains to promote new enterprises which would never be thought of but for the power electric lighting Inconsequent al the electric lighting end of the business is generally inconsequent inconsequential al and in most cases probably less than 2 per cent of the power companas comp anys business entailing a big accounting force hundreds or even thousands of small bills as many meters many meter readers and bill collectors stationery postage and other office expenses and many complaints it requires more mileage of distribution lines often intricate and under conditions of construction and maintenance that are far more difficult than required by larger power users sometimes these distribution lines are through streets or under ground and always entail much expense owing to low voltage and are accompanied compa nied by transformer expense and transmission losses the lighting business while a public necessity can hardly be considered very profitable by itself in the face of the heavy outlay of capital As a necessity with its attending overhead expense the greater number of lights the nearer it comes to carrying its own weight power secondary consideration formerly in the early history of electric lighting every community had its electric light and power company lighting was the primary object of the company the by letson balliet E U M C E 1508 hasco hobart habart building san franci francisco cal word light came first in the name of the company power was the secondary consideration the rates were high for light and the power plants often operated only after dark in some communities they were forced to run in day time to light cellars basements halls etc but the peak load with such companies came in the early evening under these conditions the power companies made low rates for power consumers who would use the capacity of the plant in the day time sausage mills printing presses small machine shops and the like were given lower rates than the lighting rate as an inducement to use the energy by day to carry the expense the result was that a number of power uses have far exceeded the fondest dreams of the early power companies and power rates have always been lower than the rates demand beyond expectations these conditions and the frequent use of the words cheap power have built up a power demand beyond the expectations of the p power ower companies and the demand is growing and gaining momentum as it grows cheap power misleading in one way I 1 think that the frequently used term cheap power has been unfortunate inasmuch as it had a tendency to create a carelessness in the efficient use of power and I 1 fear that I 1 will be boldly disputed if I 1 venture to estimate the actual work units that reach beneficial application out of the total work units generated or delivered power factors load factors and demand factors are not given proper consideration because electricity is cheap power it is common for power companies to install demand meters and to base their rates or charges upon the peak or maximum demand for power this is undoubtedly just and fair by the power companies for it is in reality only penalizing the consumer for inefficiency in the use of the energy electricity certainly is the most efficient of powers if it is made to work efficiently it is capable of great flexibility and is easy of transmission to various parts of the plant or property I 1 cannot lay the blame for inefficient use of the power to the consumers at least not wholly the talk of cheap power by the contract salesman has done much to make the consumer careless this we must admit but the power companies have been content to penalize demand meters and let the consumer pay the higher rate why should the power company care it if the consumer does not now comes the problem that more power is needed or the demand factors must be improved to improve the demand factors means that if the rate per kilowatt hour is lowered to present consumers they will use less energy and more consumers can he be served with the same amount of power facts and figures to illustrate mining hoists run by motors have a very bad load and demand factor A mining hoist with 50 horsepower motor may lift a given load 1000 feet in two minutes it might be called upon to hoist one load and stand idle for an hour before another is hoisted it may hoist six loads in an hour or fifty loads in eight hours and then be idle all night to start the load from the bottom may require an instantaneous peak load of horsepower and then only 40 horsepower for the balance of the two minutes the relation of the maximum demand to its kilowatt hours used is relatively large you will note that if fifty loads are hoisted in eight hours the power is actually in use but one hundred minutes one hour and forty minutes out of twenty four hours but the power company must be ready at all times in the 1440 minutes of the day to serve that hoist motor with horsepower peak demand though it receives pay only for the kilowatts us used ed during minutes in addition to this the power company must carry the line losses and transforming losses over the twenty four hours for less than two hours pay it is manifestly to the benefit of the consumer to reduce his peak demand and his kilowatt consumption but he does not care to because he has been told that electricity Is cheap power if he could reduce his peak load to 50 horsepower perhaps two or three other consumers could be served off the same line who are now deprived of the use of power because the power company the capacity to serve three times horsepower on that line if I 1 may be permitted to cite some concrete conditions without mentioning names or localities that have come within my personal observation I 1 may make my meaning clearer an instance cited in one mining camp served by a california power company there is a circuit five miles long that serves fourteen mines with power for hoists compressors and pumps the pumps run twenty four hours the compressors pres sors run eight hours one runs sixteen some of the mines run one eight hour shift some two eight hour shifts and some three eight hour shifts any of these may take a notion to change the number of shifts any time no notice to the power company is required the power is in the line twenty four hours it is hardly possible that all fourteen of these hoists would come onto the line at the same instant but if they should the power must be there ath berwise men coming away from a blast might be left underground there is no hoist motor on this circuit less than 50 horsepower and one has horsepower no hoist runs continuously they all take about two minutes to hoist then they stand at rest while unloading the return is made without power and generally ten or fifteen minutes is taken to load up before the next trip is made with one exception all these mines are equipped with far too big transformer capacity over capacity means a core loss in transformers that is unnecessary adjust demand factor I 1 was called upon first by two of the mining companies to adjust their demand factor and after reducing their hoisting power bills 58 and 76 per cent respectively the power company called upon me to do the same with the other twelve the result is a lower power bill for the mining companies with the same amount of work being done and the power company is serving six more mines on that circuit the same amount of water coming down hill without further investment in generators or substation equipment furnished six new industries with power that could not have been carried at all had the tha power company been up to its capacity limit the power bills paid by the new customers increased the revenues from that circuit more than 20 per cent notwithstanding the reduction to the original users I 1 am striving to make this illustrative to the business managers of industries i to point out their losses and wastes that they may reduce their power bills and permit others to be served who may now be denied service for lack of capacity there are industries that use power to such an extent that their bills amount to or more in a dozen plants that have come under my observation not one is getting 50 per cent efficiency fici ency out of their power consumption an example given one plant for example had a power bill of about a month a demand factor of horsepower an average working load of 1100 horsepower ava transformer capacity motor horsepower connected metered under the state law of that state on the secondary side of the transformers with the power company owning the transformers in the west it is almost universal for big companies to own their own transformers and be metered on the primary side thus paying for the transformer core losses which would have made in the above instance an increase of 1200 or 1500 in the consumers bill and the manager thought he had cheap pow power e r 11 without stopping a machine or making extensive change in equipment the same plant installed some new machines and turns out even more work than before but I 1 succeeded in bringing its power bill down to per month I 1 do not wish to be iconoclastic but circumstances are forcing meto me to tear down some images of idealism due to lack of conservatism in the use of electricity which is called cheap power there are thousands of mining plants being operated by electric power figuring the foot pounds of work done including the weight of the cage car cable and load not one per cent of the hoists will show an efficiency of 30 per cent of the kilowatt hours used in hoisting to say nothing about the high peak demands air compressors run with a good load factor when properly designed but figuring the work units performed by the compressor reduced to horsepower hours against the horsepower input to the motors the compressors are hogs for power and few will show better efficiency than the hoist reduced to H P one plant that I 1 have in mind had over horsepower installed driving compressors computing all the air tools hoists and pumps in the workings and assuming that every one worked continuously and at the same time but horsepower bascon bained in the work units performed had the efficiency been per cent and all tools and equipment kept in simultaneous operation horsepower would have carried the load observation has brought out the fact that the bigger the plant and equipment the less care is given to conserving this so called cheap power this brings us back to our subject again how much further could a prospect or new mine be developed with a power bill monthly than with a or bill could be an and how many more prospects would be developed under the transmission lines in territory already served with power how many new industries could be started and served with the same power now being served to others who are operating inefficiently how much more would the power companies ser 1119 receive for their power by serving the several industries instead of one with power now wasted gr ow how much faster would industries of use into bigger industries with efficient power than with wasteful use of energy thus the bigger the industry grows avs the more power it would need upon power po load factors and more hydroelectric would be necessary botn both t g paradoxical as it may seem by gaiu ga power company and the consumer the conservation of the power |