Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1907-06-13
GREAT RAILROAD SCHEME.
An Enormous Saving Made by the
Use of Electricity

Use of Electricity.
Until recently there does not ap-
pear to have been any suggestion to
conserve all the water power of a
country to drive all the railroads of
the same country. Yet this is what is
now proposed to do in Switzerland,
says the Forum.
That thrifty little country possesses
no coal but does contain many Alpine
streams capable of direction so as to
render high heads available for power
purposes. A number of these streams
have already been utilized both for
local power and lighting and also for
the operation of mountain railways.
Now, however. it is seriously pro-
posed to develop the hydraulic power
of Switzerland as a whole, and apply
it electrically to the propulsion of the
trains on the existing main line rail
ways, thus avoiding the necessity for
importing coal for railway transport
purposes, and developing the power
resources of the land itself
Such an undertaking necessarily de-
mands most careful preliminary in
vestigatton and planning and a pOr-
ton Of this work has already been
done by a government commission. 1t
seems that the mean requirement, TAX
ing the average of the winter and
summer service, calls for a continuous
development Of 100000 horsepower,
while the maximum load may become
five times this amount.
The latter estimate assumes the
provision Of the best storage methods
available, such as the construction of
reservoirs for equalizing the supply of
water, and the installation of electric
storage batteries for meeting the
daily load fluctuations, so that it will
be necessary. for the success of the
scheme. that 500 900 horsepower of
hydraulic energy be developed. 1t
does not yet appear that the water
powers of Switzerland are capable of
meeting such a demand, and the COM
mission has this side of the problem
under investigation at the present
time.
A far greater scheme than the
above is that laid before the Ameri-
can Institute of Electrical Engineers
by Messrs. Stillwell and Putnam. this
being nothing less than the CONVEX
sion of the entire motive power sys-
tenn of the railroads of the United
States from steam locomotives to
electric traction and stationary
power houses. This paper includes
a complete analysis Of the present
operating costs of the railroads under
existing conditions, comparing these
with a careful estimate OF the cor
responding costs for complete electric
traction.
AS a consequence of this investiga-
ton it appears that if the single
phase system, as adopted by the New
York New Haven & Hartford rail-
roal. were installed on all the rail
roads CT the United States, with gen
Grating stations such as are now in
actual service, the aggregate cost of
operation, now about 81, 100000 a
year. would be reduced by about
$3.50. coo O0O This result would re-
quire the installation of power plants
delivering about 1880, 100000 kilo-
watt hours a year; and assuming a
radius Of transmission of $50 miles. it
appears that a maximum output OF
about 100000 kilowatts would be
enough to operate the entire railway
service of the United States as I'll
existed in 1905.
Compared with this magnificent