Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1897-07-20

visitor will have to pay from fifty cents to
a dollar for the privilege of getting out.
The state of New York has, however, pro-
vided facilities for people who desire to
ride around Niagara Falls by establishing
a line of coaches, which carry passengers
to all the desirable points in the vicinity
for the charge of fifteen cents per passea-
ger.
AS a matter of fact, one can visit Mag
ara Falls and see all its beauties at an ex-
pense of less than a dollar-this even in
Guiding good meal-or it can be made to
cost ten dollars, and yet he will see no
more than he could at the lower figure.
There are many men around Niagara,
however, who lie in wait for the stranger,
and seem to think that all visitors are
their legitimate prey, provided they can
entice them into their net. The Washing
.tonian who proposes to visit Niagara Falls
will find it advisable upon getting there to
make his contracts for any service he may
wish before the service is rendered.
Outside of the falls, the great attraction
at Niagara is the immense power house
which now supplies the electricity for
lighting Buffalo. thirty-two miles away,
and with which efforts are being made to
New York city 462 miles distant. In speak
ing of what it is believed be accom-
plshed through the medium of this power
house a prominent official said:
The Power of the Falls.
Making all necessary allowance for loss
in a hydraulic plant, the power of Niagara
Falls. if it could be utilized as whole,
would supply more than three million arc
lamps of 1000 nominal candle power each.
An idea of what that number means may
be obtained by imagining a row of arc
lamps on either side of railway track
extending from New York to San Fran
cisco. Were the number named available,
2OHi-candle power lamps might be located
on either side of the track at intervals Oh
twelve feet throughout the entire distance
Expressed in terms of power
incandescent lamps, there is sufficient pow
er to drive 600 generators like those now IN
stalled in the power house of the Niagara
Falls Power Company, each OF WhlcG sup
plies energy equal to that required by a@out
ii. go 50-Watt lamps; or, to put it in sAill
another way, the power of Niagara, II
used for the refining of copper by electro
lysis, would deposit more than 2,ooo net
tons per hour.
There is an important difference between
using the energy of coal and utilizing the
energy of water for power purposes. Coal
cnce burned cannot be used again. Water
power. on the other hand is a solar engine,
perennialIy renewed. We may utilize the
energy OF Niagara today without subtract
ing single horsepower from that which
nature intended, not only for our age. but
for future ages. The thought therefore,
Immediately suggests itself that we should,
so far as possible, utilize water powers in
the mechanic arts. burning coal only for
our protection from cold, for the prepara-
ton of food, for necessary metallurgical
purposes, and other uses. If this be i'm
practicable. We should at least see to it
that our utilization of the energy of coal
does not involve undue waste.
Utilization of the Force.
''Of course, not all of the power of Nj
agara can be utilized. Aside from aesthetic
consideration, which will. perhaps, for all
time prevent the utilization of sufficient
amount to impair the beauty of the falls.
and considering the subject simply as an
engineering problem, large deductions from
the figures above named must be made to
cover the distance between the total and
effective head, this difference representing
the fall in canals and tunnels, conveying
water to and from the wheels. l suppose
1t would be possible to deliver about a.
O00uOO horsepower to the turbines, and to
this amount the turbines would deliver
about 40. $50 horsepower at their shaft.
1t is estimated that it would be neces-
sary to burn more than 10000 600 tons of
coal per annum to- develop power equal to
that OF the Niagara river, from the upper
limit of the rapids to the gorge below the
falls. This would be substantially one
third the coal product of the world. and
would materially exceed the entire amo"nt
of coal now used for power purposes. With
the best of modern steam plants, the con-
sumption Of coal would still exceed the
entire annual output of the anthracite coal
fields of Pennsylvania.
4 Solar Engine.
Water raised by the sun from sea and
lake and river is precipitated to the earth
by changes of temperature, finds its way
into the great lakes and thence by the
way of the Niagara river to the rapids
above the falls. more than 200 feet above
the level of the water in the gorge, imme-
diately below the cataract. To raise a
pound of water from the river below the
gorge 10 the head Of the rapids a force of
one pound must be eXerted through a dis
lance, say, of 200 feet. Therefore every
pound of water at the upper end of the
rapids represents 200 foot pounds of ener-
gy, which are given up in falling to the
lower level. The rate of flow exceeds 1000
tens of water per second, and the total
power is estimated to exceed 5,SO0,OOO
horsepower.