Electricity

I am not good at public speaking and I hesitated making this talk because whenever I talk about electricity, the audience has responded with abandonment, chill and silence as I see now in our regretful faces.

The microscope and electrical instruments of precision have increased our knowledge.

Our knowledge of form is dependent on light propagating in straight lines which forms the image by a lens, exactly similar to the object seen.

I believe that most all human knowledge is based on this simple truth, since practically every idea or conception — and therefore all knowledge — presupposes visual impressions.

The progress in a measured time is nowadays more rapid and greater than it ever was before.

We are getting a sense of the connectedness of the apparently different forces and phenomena.

The expansion of the science of electricity, has been a most potent factor.

The economical production of high-frequency currents is now an accomplished fact.

I have referred to the merging together of the various sciences or departments of research, and to a certain perception of intimate connection between the manifold and apparently different forces and phenomena.

Light, radiant heat, electrical and magnetic actions are closely related.

The chemist knows that the effects of combination and separation of bodies are due to electrical forces

The physician and physiologist say that even life’s progress is electrical.

Thus this age can claim the name “Age of Electricity.”

I want to tell you what electricity really is.

The problem of the steam engine was in converting heat energy into mechanical power.

The reciprocating motion of the piston was not practical unless it was connected to a crank to get rotating motions.

But even this was crude and wasteful.

The engineer’s task was now to concentrate all his efforts on one type of engine – the best; the universal, the one best suitable for the generation of electricity.

The gas or explosive engine has been likewise affected by the commercial introduction of electric light and power.

There are many other lines of manufacture and industry in which the influence of electrical development has been even more powerfully felt.

Bell enabled us to transmit speech to great distances. It has profoundly affected our commercial and social relations, and even our very mode of life.

Edison is one of the greatest benefactors of the age.

Westinghouse is the founder of the commercial alternating system.

Brush is the great pioneer of arc lighting.

Thomson gave us the first practical welding machine and who, with keen sense, contributed very materially to the development of a number of scientific and industrial branches.

Weston once led the world in dynamo design. He now leads in the construction of electric instruments.

Sprague, who, with rare energy, mastered the problem and insured the success of practical electrical railroading.

Acheson, Hall, Willson and others, who are creating new and revolutionizing industries here under our very eyes at Niagara.

The electrical transmission of power dominates all other areas of research.

If we want to reduce poverty and misery, we want to provide more machinery, more power.

Centralized Energy

A great deal is expected from a more economical utilization of the stored energy of the carbon in a battery. But this is not the proper path.

The proper way for both economy and convenience are through energy supply from central stations.

The advantages of this universally accepted method are certainly so great that the probability of replacing the engine dynamos by batteries is, in my opinion, a remote one, the more so as the high-pressure steam engine and gas engine give promise of a considerably more economical thermodynamic conversion.

Even if we had this day such an economical coal battery, its introduction in central stations would by no means be assured, as its use would entail many inconveniences and drawbacks.

Very likely the carbon could not be burned in its natural form as in a boiler, but would have to be specially prepared to secure uniformity in the current generation. There would be a great many cells needed to make up the electro-motive force usually required.

The process of cleaning and renewal, the handling of nasty fluids and gases and the great space necessary for so many batteries would make it difficult, if not commercially unprofitable, to operate such a plant in a city or densely populated district.

If the station be built in the outskirts, the conversion by rotating transformers or otherwise would be a serious and unavoidable drawback.

• The regulating appliances and other accessories which would have to be provided would probably make the plant fully as much, if not more, complicated than the present.

We could place the batteries at or near the coal mine, and from there transmit the energy to distant points in the form of high-tension alternating currents obtained from rotating transformers.

But even in this most favorable case, the process would be a barbarous one as it would involve the consumption of material.

It would restrict the engineer and mechanic in the exercise of their beautiful art.

The development of a light storage battery can supply energy in small isolated places such as houses.

• This involves the use of chemicals manufactured by cheap water power, such as some carbide or oxygen-hydrogen cell.

We should go beyond improving steam and explosive engines or inventing new batteries. We have to evolve means for obtaining energy from inexhaustible stores and perfect methods which do consume nor waste any material.

Hydropower

The simplicity of converting the mechanical energy of running water into electrical energy is unmatched. But that method needs currents of very high tension sent to great distances.

A waterfall affords us the most advantageous means of getting power from the sun for all our wants. This is why water power is important because of its bearing on our safety and welfare.

With water power, I have devised means which will allow us the use in power transmission of electromotive forces much higher than those practicable with ordinary apparatus.

In fact, progress in this field has given me fresh hope that I shall see the fulfillment of one of my fondest dreams; namely, the transmission of power from station to station without the employment of any connecting wire. Still, whatever method of transmission be ultimately adopted, nearness to the source of power will remain an important advantage.

Some of the ideas I have expressed may appear to many of you hardly realizable.

Nevertheless, they are the result of long-continued thought and work.

You would judge them more justly if you would have devoted your life to them, as I have done.

With ideas it is like with dizzy heights you climb: At first they cause you discomfort and you are anxious to get down, distrustful of your own powers; but soon the remoteness of the turmoil of life and the inspiring influence of the altitude calm your blood; your step gets firm and sure and you begin to look — for dizzier heights.

I have attempted to speak to you on “Electricity,” its development and influence, but I fear that I have done it much like a boy who tries to draw a likeness with a few straight lines.

But I have endeavored to bring out one feature, to speak to you in one strain which I felt sure would find response in the hearts of all of you, the only one worthy of this occasion — the humanitarian. In the great enterprise at Niagara we see not only a bold engineering and commercial feat, but far more, a giant stride in the right direction as indicated both by exact science and philanthropy.

Its success is a signal for the utilization of water powers all over the world, and its influence upon industrial development is incalculable.

We must all rejoice in the great achievement and congratulate the intrepid pioneers who have joined their efforts and means to bring it about. It is a pleasure to learn of the friendly attitude of the citizens of Buffalo and of the encouragement given to the enterprise by the Canadian authorities.

We shall hope that other cities, like Rochester on this side and Hamilton and Toronto in Canada, will soon follow Buffalo’s lead. This fortunate city herself is to be congratulated.

With resources now unequaled, with commercial facilities and advantages such as few cities in the world possess, and with the enthusiasm and progressive spirit of its citizens, it is sure to become one of the greatest industrial centers of the globe.