OUR COAL AND OUR PROSPERITY. [To THE EDITOR OF THE
" SPECTATOR."] SIE;In your article in the Spectator of December 18th on "Oar Coal and Our Prosperity" you suggest the more extended substitution of electricity for steam as "the motor- power." You anticipate the discovery of cheaper means of accumulating electricity and distributing it. All this is no doubt true ; but it is questionable whether it will save this country an ounce of coal. Behind all machines there must be an initial source of power. There are only three such sources of power of any importance,—viz., the fall of water, wind- power, the heat evolved by the combustion of coal. The first, the energy developed by our rainfall in its passage to the sea, is. theoretically, of considerable amount. But the proportion capable of doing useful work in turbines, &c., is utterly incapable of driving a hundredth part of the machinery of our busy island. Wind-power is limited, and uncertain. On coal, and coal alone, can we rely. Whether it is used to produce steam, and through the steam-engine do work directly, or whether this steam-engine drives a dynamo, and the electricity produced actuates a motor, still coal is the initial source of power. One invention there is which would render the steam- engine obsolete, introduce electricity universally, and halve the consumption of coal per horse-power. This is a practical [Our article, following one on water-power and electricity published in the summer, assumed that the water-power in rivers and tides would ultimately be used to generate electricity. When coal gets really dear the wits of the inventors will be sharpened.—En. Spectator.]
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