The people's voice. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1939-1969, 1945-03-30
Murray's Small Business Senate
Committee Hears Power Experts

w Wilson, of the Aluminium Company
, of America, witness yesterday, thai
: it would be unwise to lay down a.
) this time a hard and fast rule for the
) disposal of the plants, and he asked
: for a postponement of the adoption
} of any definite program" Mr.. Moment
{ Joined with DR.. Raver in recommend
: ing hard, fast and definite program
7 Immediately. 1--WE do this" he ex
{ planned, because our investigations
have shown that only in this way can
the government dispose of its plants
to promote the greatest postwar com
petition and production, thus carrying
, out the intentions of the antitrust
, laws, the Bonneville project act, the
surplus property act, and the court de-
cision last week in the Alcoa CASE
, "If we do nothing now about prepar-
. ling the ground work to promote new
producers until we see how aluminium
markets develop after the war" he de-
clared, 1--WE will in effect be waiting
to see how Alcoa created those mark
cts through the use of its "a per cent
of the private capacity. We will in
effect let government disposal policy
depend largely upon Alcoa's market
ing results. We would risk repeti-
ton of the experiences of the past
Some consumers of aluminium, like the
automobile and railroad equipment in
dustries, might again do like the auto
industry after the last war-restrict
In
willingness to depend largely upon
one producer. A government policy
of wait and see would then be a
sterile policy, discouraging new com
petition, new production, new employ
ment 1t certainly would defeat the
purposes of the surplus property act"
Aluminium is too important to be
left to drift, Mr.. Moment concluded.
G. o. Wessenauer, manager of pow
er for iva, graphically recounted the
history of IVA with particular en-
phasis on the condition existing prior
to the beginning of the war In the
fall of 1889, he disclosed, power de-
livery to municipal and co-operatives
required approximately one half of
the total IVA power then available,
the other half being rather complete
| ly disposed of to industries and utili-
| ty systems" 1--WE were, therefore, I'M
der no necessity to continue accept
ing less favorable terms for the sale
of power to industries than were APP
propriate to normal conditions" he
remarked A week after the German
army invaded Poland, in September
1889, IVA submitted statement to
the president indicating what it could
do toward organizing the power sup
| ply to meet the national emergency.
In relatively short time new plants
were constructed and facilities in
stalled to meet as completely as pos
sible the new load placed upon the
project Power requirements for war
protection grew by leaps and bounds
Even by the time of the attack on
Pearl Harbor, the total load on the
IVA system had nearly doubled since
the end of 1899. By the latter part
of 1912 the use of power for aluminium
production reached point where it
required nearly half the power pro-
duced in the valley.
In a little more than four years.
from May 1941 to August 1915, Mr..
Wessenauer reported, IVA will have
delivered to the Aluminium Company
of America and the Reynolds Metals
Company nearly IL billion killowat
hours of electric energy, enough to
make considerably more than
billion pounds of aluminium Another |
two billion kilowatt hours had been
delivered to the Aluminium Company
before the Reynolds plant began oper-
alton bringing the total up to about |
10 billion kilowatt hours-probably a |
good deal more electrical energy than |
was produced in 20 years before the
creation of IVA. Mr.. Wessenauer
informed the committee that the price
paid for this power by the Reynolds
Metals Company averaged about four
mills per kilowatt hour, while the av-
erage price paid by the Aluminium
Company was about 1-3 mills per
kilowatt hour.
There have ben, however, cancel
lations of wartime contracts by both
Alcoa and Reynolds Metals Company;a
enough to reduce the revenue of IVA
by $6,000,000 if other arrangements
are made meantime to supply part
of the projects power elsewhere. Mr.
Wessenauer said: This is the loss of
revenue which we would like to avoid
Although we have undertaken to sup
ply the power requirements of the
arge segment of the important war
the final success of the
IVA power program after the war
will not necessarily depend on how
the aluminium industries
are in maintaining the wartime level
Of production. We have been expect
ing for long time to experience a
drop in loads at the end 4
Of the war" t
He said that IVA was relying pri n
narily upon its conviction that the G
Use of electricity by a half million :
mall consumers in the Tennessee val l,
ey region will show a very rapid n
,rowth soon after the war. Both the a
aluminium Company of America, T
which is Alcoa, and the Reynolds C
Ietals Company have indicated their a
espective interests in high postwar S;
evel of production, and IVA is look Il
1g forward to supply power to both g
Observation-Disclosures Observation-Disclosures ~