Abstract
UNTIL a couple of years ago the problem of electricity supply in London was mainly one of interest to engineers and investors. Its introduction into the realm of municipal politics, however, has given it a wider interest, and one that tends to obscure the purely scientific aspect of the problem. Alike in connection with water, with gas, and with electricity, London has suffered from the fact of its slow growth and of its being composed of a number of separate towns and districts; its very magnitude, which to-day would enable it to be supplied with electricity more cheaply than any other great city, has been the chief hindrance to its getting such a supply. The enormous number of authorities authorised to supply electricity in Greater London, which at the present time exceeds seventy, has resulted in the establishment of nearly sixty generating stations, many of which are of comparatively small size and inefficient design. The municipal authorities have also been confined to their own boundaries and compelled to choose uneconomical sites, and any attempts at combination between the various authorities which might have enabled them to secure some of the advantages of production on a larger scale have been prevented by the restrictive legislation under which they operate, legislation which was originally passed before the future developments of electricity production were appreciated, while the still more remarkable developments in the uses of electric powe were entirely unforeseen. An attempt at concentration was long ago made by the London Electric Supply Corporation, which established its great station at Deptford. That it was not successful was not due to any unsoundness of the principle upon which it was based, but to the fact that it was before its time. Fifteen years afterwards, in 1905, a fresh proposal embodying the first step in the policy of concentration was brought forward by a private company; several of the existing companies at the same time brought forward proposals, not for complete concentration, but for dividing London into three areas, in each of which a supply would be ultimately centralised.
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Electric Power in London . Nature 75, 418–419 (1907). https://doi.org/10.1038/075418a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/075418a0