OUGH ESTIMATE OF COST OF TRANSMISSION LINE FROM SACANDAGA POWER-HOUSE TO ALBANY VIA GLENS FALLS, SARATOGA, WATERFORD, COHOES AND TROY. (BY R. D. JOHNSON.) The following rough estimate assumes the transmission of 50,000 kilowatts over a distance sixty-three miles, merely as a convenient first approximation. There is no probability hat so large a volume of power would be called for at Albany. Since the price of copper is now at a minimum and since in reaching other communities, the total length of line might be longer than is here reckoned, and notwithstanding that much less than 50,000 kilowatts would be transmitted so far as Albany, it appears prudent as a first approximation to assume the cost of the transmission line at, say, $900,000. The estimate shows a cost of only $808,000, and is as follows: To deliver 50,000 kilowatts sixty-three miles, 25 cycles per second, 80,000 volts delivered, power factor 85 per cent. Put up two lines, each of which would deliver the whole power by crowding it, say, to a 11.1 per cent. loss at peaks. The average power paid for would not exceed 35,000 kilowatts on basis, so our loss would be only x 5.55 or 3.9 per cent. = 1,070,000 x 18 cents $193,000. x = 5.55 per cent. twenty-four-hour 35 50 Tower line including all labor and material of stringing wire, etc.. $2,100 per mile. 2,500 per mile. 3,060 per mile. $7,660 Cost of two lines (5,160 x 2 + 2,500) x 63 = $808,000, for sixty-three miles. SACANDAGA PROJECT-YEARLY CHARGES. FIRST STAGE-USED FOR STORAGE FOR BENEFIT OF HUDSON RIVER POWERS. The foregoing preliminary estimates have shown for the Sacandaga project in its first stage with dam built and power-house deferred, for all real estate, rights, reservoir, dam, new highways, etc., a cost including interest during construction of about..... $5,000,000 The yearly interest on this, at 4 per cent., is. . . . . . . The annual payment to a sinking fund which would at the end of fifty years MAINTENANCE. Nothing is simpler than caring for storage reservoir and occasionally regulating its gates, but altho Indian Lake, for example, would show very low cost of maintenance each year, the State could not hope to carry on this work so cheaply under the higher standards expected of it. We therefore estimate as follows: For one superintendent, four patrol men and the maintenance of one motor boat and for petty supplies, with occasional work on margins and snags, say per year. For bookkeeping, power measurement, assessment and collecting of power rentals, say.. Total yearly fixed charges and maintenance.. $200,000 33,000 10,000 15,000 15,000 10,000 7,000 $290,000 The increase in power at sites along the Hudson already more or less developed, shown on page 153, averages about 80,000 horse power of 24 hour power for 6 months in the year. The yearly charges as just figured would therefore, if averaged over all of this power, amount to a total cost of $3.75 per horse power per year. But by no means all of the plants are in position to immediately make use of, or pay for, all of this increased power. A careful canvass would need to be made before any reliable statement of the yearly income could be made. I have little doubt that investigation would show that some of the largest concerns engaged in the transmission of electric power would receive benefits of upward of $25 per horse power per year and that others engaged in manufacturing would receive the equiva-lent of at least $10 per year for each horse power under this 100 per cent. load factor. Therefore it is reasonable to believe that in course of a few years a rental could be secured' from, say, two-thirds of the total falls, that would leave the State a large direct profit on the outlay of about $4,500,000 to $5,000,000 for this reservoir in addition to the large indirec gains already mentioned. Merely for purposes of illustration : If out of the 80,000 horse power of increased 24 hour power, (remembering that cost of turbines and penstocks and depreciation on same has yet to be provided for by the mill owners) we assume 10,000 horse power, 24 hour power at $25 tax = $250,000 per year. we find a profit above interest and maintenance of over half a million dollars per year. This it should be clearly understood is not presented as an estimate; for the present is merely a progress report, and as stated above, a canvass of the conditions for profitable increase at the several sites has not yet been made. Altho during this first stage of use for benefit of the water powers on the main Hudson, the storage water would be run for only about six months out of the twelve in an average year, it has substantially the value of an addition of this amount of power for the full year, because this present surplus flow of the flood months is hardly worth putting in turbines for. For example, at Lowell, Mass., and Lawrence, Mass., after more than fifty years of manufacturing activity, the surplus flow of the wet half of the year still runs to waste. At some of the Hudson plants, the present conditions are different from those at Lowell and Lawrence, since to a moderate extent a surplus of wood pulp can be ground in the months when water is plenty. Nevertheless, as the following table shows, the present turbine capacity in proportion to the flow of the stream is not excessive, and there would be water provided for many additional turbines. The following table shows that at the present time the total turbine capacity at the principal power sites, altho larger than can be filled by the average yield of water in the dryest month, is in general only about half as great as the turbine capacity which could be continuously supplied after the Sacandaga had been regulated as herein proposed. Any scheme of rentals or taxation for these betterments should provide for a revaluation of the annual rental at intervals of about 20 years, and for rates differing with the use, and lower rates for local use than for long distance transmission. LOCATION. PRESENT LIMITS OF TURBINE DEVELOPMENT ON HUDSON. For Twenty-four-hour, Seven-day Flow. *Note that the Electric Power Stations use water at a rate that varies from hour to hour, and that the capacity shown above is for peak loads. 550 1.0 net horse-power under 1.0 ft. fall @ 80% catalog efficiency requires = 11.0 second-feet of turbine discharge. 62.4 x 80% The total fall in vicinity of Corinth and Glens Falls is over 350 feet, and with water-power interests in view, it is obviously better to regulate for uniform flow for this 2,775 square miles of watershed than for the 4,500 square miles at Mechanicville or where the fall is only about 50 feet. Compare Note The present extent of turbine capacity is substantially the same as the volume of water flowing in the dryest month in the year. column 6 with column 5. SACANDAGA POWER-HOUSE OPERATION. For the second stage of development, the cost of the long tunnel, and of the power-house and its equipment complete and of dredging the tailrace channel and transmission lines, with interest during construction may be as much as..... $5,000,000 Distributing this over the twenty-four-hour seven-day power, if on a 24 hour basis of 5,000,000 30,000 horse power would give a cost of = $167 per net horse power. 30,000 But this is manifestly unfair because the estimates cover cost of building and equipping with machinery of about 80,000 horse power. Since the power could probably be ultimately sold under a forty per cent. load factor 5,000,000 60,000 = and to the extent of 60,000 horse power, the cost on this basis $83 per horse power delivered to consumers, for cost of waterways, station and transmission lines, and exclusive of cost of reservoir. The cost of steam power for the number of hours per day equivalent to the average number of hours during which this power of 60,000 horse-power could be furnished 24 x 7 (which is X 40 per cent. 11.2 hours for 6 days per week), with best modern 6 plant of large size and with cheap coal, would be about $20 per horse power per year, if all fixed charges, insurance, contingencies, depreciation, renewals, etc., are reckoned in. In the prospectus of the large power plant now under construction on the Connecticut river near Brattleboro, Vt., where 12,000 horse power of twelve-hour power is to be developed, excellent authorities are quoted for the statement that manufacturers in a region fairly comparable with that which this plant would serve, can afford to pay $25 per horse power per year for ten-hour power. PROBABLE YEARLY COST TO THE STATE FOR FULL SACANDAGA DEVELOPMENT. (Rough Preliminary Approximation.) OPERATION OF POWER-HOUSE AND TRANSMISSION LINES. The interest on $5,000,000, at 4 per cent. per year to the State. $200,000 33,000 Contingencies, accidents, forfeits due failure to supply, say... 25,000 Attendance, power-house and transmission lines, exclusive of reservoir, say. 75,000 10,000 Total....... $428,000 Cost per horse power per year, if all be reckoned as twenty-four-hour seven-day power428,0001 or about $14 per horse power per year, or if reckoned as used on the average 11.2 30,000 hours per week day, or under a forty per cent. load factor, the cost per year would be about $6.00, based on complete utilization, which is only about one-third of the lowest cost of steam power on a ten-hour basis in large plants. But one must not be misled by such figures. The full income would not be attained for several years. Much time would be required to secure a line of customers for so large an amount at full prices. Cities within convenient reach might be supplied at wholesale at $10 to $15 per horse power per year for this 40 per cent. load factor power, which would be equivalent to 0.38 to 0.57 cents per kilowatt hour, and I have little doubt that users for the remainder, at, say, prices ranging from $15 to $25 according to circumstances and subject to increase at end of a five-year, ten-year or twenty-year term, could be found after some years, and that at the suggested revaluations after each ten or twenty years' period, a gradual increase in the scale would be found fair. THE REAL PROFIT ON THE INVESTMENT. The chief profit to the State would be largely indirect, and would come from the more complete development of this part of its great natural resources, by which the same drainage area will yield more power and a more uniform power, and through the possibility under State control of devoting this power to more valuable uses and ultimately to purposes that will set many more men at work and build new industrial communities, whereas under private control much of it would be used for, replacing steam power now in use. The gain will come, too, in the creation of lakes more beautiful, by reason of beds and shores better prepared, and with sluices set so high that the lake can never be emptied in severest drought, and by better highways around the new lakes. From the projected Sacandaga improvement, there would come many benefits which cannot readily be figured in dollars, such as the larger summer flow for diluting the sewage that the river received and for bettering the present source of Poughkeepsie water supply by driving the brackish water farther seaward, the better flow for navigation over the shallows from Troy to New Baltimore, the lessening of the flood depths and dangers at Albany, Troy and at other towns along the stream, and from all these sources the Commonwealth would be benefited, although it merely got a new dollar for an old one in the State Treasurer's bookkeeping. That there are, however, possibilities of direct return from even the elaborate scale on which this trial design has been laid out, may be seen from the foregoing brief computations presented on pages 173 and 175, which are on rentals assumed at rates that would leave a generous return to the customer. STUDIES ON GENESEE RIVER. Inspection at Request of County and City Officials. Soon after the organization of work under the Fuller bill, the State Water Supply Commission received a request from the county supervisors and later from the Mayor of Rochester, urging a visit of personal inspection by the Commissioners and their engineers and an investigation of the possibilities of power development and flood control on this river. Such a visit was made upon September 13, 1907, the Commission and its engineers being escorted by the Mayor of Rochester, the City Engineer and by delegations from the Board of Aldermen, the City Council and the Rochester Chamber of Commerce. Proceeding up the valley by the railroad, the large areas subject to disastrous overflow were pointed out, and the several sites for a storage reservoir that had been proposed at Portage and near Mount Morris were carefully inspected. The beautiful scenery of the Genesee Falls and of Glen Iris were also the object |