Show WHEN COAL WILL NOT BE USED thomas edison ho great mikea a prediction as follows it would not surprise me any morning 0 o wake up and learn that someone some group 0 the tine men who aro investigating all over the canh has seized upon the secret of electricity by direct process and begun another practical revolution in human affairs it can bo done it will be done I 1 expect to see it before I 1 die the farst great change in the production of electricity will abolish carrying coal for that purpose instead of digging gross material out of tho earth loading it on cars and carrying it say miles there to put it under a boiler and burn and so got power we shall set up plants at the mouths of mines generate power there and transmit it wherever it is needed by copper wire it is preposterous to keep on putting coal mines on wheels it is too clumsy it is too costly there is no necessity for it it is easier to carry molecular vibration by millions of a second than freight cars full of ci udo matter we can ship hore power over the wire quicker and more economically than we can send the equivalent in coal over a railroad track we must eliminate the railroad altogether from this problem the use 0 it we dont want coal anyhow it does us no good to look at it what we want is the resultant of the utmost energy that can be produced and there ia no sense in carrying around millions of tons of raw material like coal when wo can get a product delivered to us by wire now the truth is thit it will cost a third lesa to transport electrical power by wire than to carry it in the form of coal in railroad cars assume the price of coal to be 1 at tho mouth of a mine and assume the freight to bo now we can turn coal into electricity at tho mine and convey it by etro by less than halt of the cost of the freightage of coal when the time comes or the energy in coal to be transmitted by wire ogden will get its power and heat from the wyoming coal measures there will be no anxiety then over the coal supply in the city wires will bear ho burden of keeping the wheels of commerce in motion even tho engines on the railroads in and out of ogden will be propelled by electric energy in this dream of he future edison as he says ia not wholly in the kealm of fancy for a nearer approach to that condition Is seen every day in tho electrical world |