The Industrious Heart A History of New Plymouth / 2:3

2:3

The Mangorei power house plant was turned on by Mayor R. Cock and a representative of the contractors, A. M. Hayes, informed the celebrities present that 'as an impartial critic I can say that the power plant is one of the very best in New Zealand'. Said the Herald: 'One hundred and twenty lamps lit up the streets excellently, and the Town Hall in King Street is a blaze oflight and colour. ' The price of power was 6c a kilowatt, and the service operated from 'dusk until midnight'. In the first year of operation there were 41 private consumers and the council's revenue was $166. Within 12 months 126 consumers had been connected and this continued to be the yearly average until 1912, when there were 230 users of electricity.
As demand increased, new machinery and reticulation was installed, and in 1918, under the provisions of the Power Boards Act, the council's area of supply was extended to include about 350 square kilometres, supplying bulk power to Inglewood, Waitara and Opunake. It provided all the city's require- ments until the State supply was connected in 1935, and up until 1950 it was supplying half of the city's needs. The rapid growth of industry and domestic appliances since then resulted in it supplying less than 10% by 1978. But it was still a great asset, producing about $100,000 worth of power annually. And although it was considered .unlikely to be extended, it played a vital role in keeping charges to consumers below those of many other New Zealand districts. Since 1974 New Plymouth, in addition to supplying its mite to the national grid, has become the site of a mighty thermal generating power station.
The huge chimney to the west of the city towers over plant capable of producing 600 megawatts, and was then the country's largest thermal power station. Built at a cost of$1 05 million, it was planned as a coal-burning facility, using the mounting stocks at the Buller coalfield to give a much-needed economic shot in the arm to the West Coast of the South Island. Planning began in 1964; building started in 1968 after a 'battle' for the site between Wanganui and New Plymouth-and protests from a large section of environmental-minded citizens. Power was generated from the first of its five turbines six years later.
When the offshore Maui gasfield was discovered the coal-fired station was well advanced. The Government decided to encourage the de- velopment of Maui by making it possible to burn oil and gas in the new station. Oil was used until the Kapuni pipeline was laid, and Maui gas followed in 1979. Building of the station, on which nearly 1000 men were employed, brought a boost to the building industry to house workers of more than 50 major companies from France, West Germany, Italy, Canada, Australia, India, Great Britain and New Zealand. Property prices soared, with some owners selling or leasing their homes and moving into caravans while the bonanza lasted. The station also re-designed the western skyline of the city. In addition to the 220-metre high chimney, massive pylons which aroused protests from the environmentalists were erected to carry the power accross country to join the national grid at Stratford, and to the Carrington Street sub-station in New Plymouth. It supplies about 12 per cent of the nation's power needs. Another-and much older-system of reticulation lies beneath the streets carrying gas to industrial and domestic users. In the 1870s a group of the town's prominent businessmen investigated the possibility of making coal gas. In spite of the fact that there was no port-not even a breakwater-which meant Greymouth coal would have to be unloaded (as were all other imports) through the surf, they formed, in 1878 'The New Plymouth Gas Company (Limited).' * Its prospectus revealed that its objects were' the manufacture and supply of Gas to the Town of New Plymouth and its suburbs; and also the manufacture and supply of Coke and other products incidental to the manufacture of Gas' .
19 Nominal capital was $20,000. At its first annual meeting on July 17, 1879, King reported the acquisition of ' an excellent section for the works and are negotiating for another quarter of an acre the first portion of the plant left Glasgow in the "Cape Clear" on the 18th April. The Directors hope that operations will be commenced early in 1880.' And on Saturday, March 6, of that year the Taranaki Herald commented: 'Tonight the town will be lighted for the first time with gas and doubtless the streets this evening will present an unusual scene of lustre and illumination. The shopkeepers have been busily engaged during the past few days having the necessary gas fittings completed ready for use, and with no less than twenty-five gas lamps fixed in our streets we may venture to promise that the town will be brilliantly illuminated tonight.
The lighting of the town with gas is a marked stride in its progress, and although there may be a few in New Plymouth who perhaps have never seen a gas-light, the majority, we think, are perfectly aware "that not only is gas offensive to the smell, but it is highly explosive" as our contemporary (the Daily News) sagely informed its readers this morning. The Company, we notice, has issued cards, on which instructions are given to consumers how to economise in the use of gas, as well as the necessary precautions to ensure safety.
Neither paper recorded the impression this historic event had on the citizens, but at the second annual meeting on July 29, 1880, the directors reported that the 'company has been in successful operation for nearly four months. The mains have been laid down for a distance of about 140 chains (about 1 3/4km) and the Company has on hand and paid for, a good supply of mains, tubes and meters for extension; 86 meters have been issued at this time, and 68 remain in stock .
The Company has on hand a supply of gas stoves, for which no doubt there will be a good demand when the warm weather sets in their convenience and comfort in cooking being now so generally acknowledged.

The demand for gas is steadily increasing ... ' Four years later, however, they reported: 'There has been a small increase in the consumption of gas, but not to such an extent as to compensate for the reduced price at which it has been sold. This, the Directors believe, is mainly owing to the wave of depression which has been everywhere felt ... ' By this time about twelve kilometres of mains had been laid and the company had secured the franchise for 'Otto Silent Gas Engines which are coming largely into use throughout the Col- ony.'?? The popularity of gas in the town fluctuated over the years, especially when electricity became more easily available, but power restrictions in the 1940s halted, for a time, the trend away from electricity. By 1952 the company was faced with economic and administrative problems, and when Athol Blackman was appointed manager, his first concern was to rehabilitate the business.
The prospect of harnessing the natural gas from the oil wells at Moturoa fascinated him, and he persuaded the company to allow him to design and lay a pipeline from the wells to the gas company's works, a distance of more than 3 km. The commissioning was a family affair. Jim Blackman, Athol's four-year-old son, turned the valve on at Moturoa, and the family then travelled by car to the works and waited. It was an anxious time, but about an hour later the gas arrived .
Then began the task of arranging a suitable mixture between manufactured and natural gas which was successfully achieved, and provided a boost for the company and its product. In spite of this there was public pressure for the company to be closed, but the Government declared the industry essential and provided money to build anew plant at acostof$150,000, and New Plymouth became the first town in the country to introduce high-pressure gas reticulation. The first house to use it was a State house at Marfell. On February 1, 1961, the city council bought the New Plymouth Gas Company's assets (and liabilities) for $204,000.
A further boost for natural gas came with the development of the Kapuni field, which led to the phasing out of coal gas. There were many problems: natural gas is dry, manufactured gas is wet, and when the joints in the old reticulation dried out, leaks occurred and as much as 60% of the supply was finding its way into the surrounding earth. This was visibly brought home during one of the floods of the Huatoki which inundated lower Devon Street. Steady streams of bubbles arose through the floodwaters every four metres, pinpointing the leaking joints. Since then all the 190km of existing reticulation have been replaced with welded steel mains and plastic systems.
The coalmaking works were demolished and the city council's gas department headquarters were transferred lower down Gill Street. In 1978 the capital value of the plant and offices was $1,750,000; there were 4000 consumers; annual revenue was $1,918,000 and a profit of $75,000 was made. * For the first 65 years of its existence New Plymouth survived without an 'official' sewerage system. Every dwelling had its 'little house' in the garden, and as the more affluent began installing sophisticated earth closets, night cart contractors plied a necessary if somewhat nauseous trade.
Dr O'Carroll wrote to the council in 1844, calling attention to the 'dangerous practice of depositing nightsoil in the Huatoki and Man- gaotuku Streams' .21 But it was not until early this century that positive steps were taken. In 1904 about 16km of pipes was installed in the central part of the town, draining into a septic tank where the women's rest rooms now stand. The partly-treated effluent discharged into the Huatoki. This system served the growing town, with occasional extensions, until 1927, when a comprehensive scheme was put forward by the borough engineer, C. Clarke.P The population of the town was about 16,000, but Clarke's scheme was designed for a population of60,000 at a daily rate of 450 litres of water per head. The cost was $317,000. It was completed in 1933 and is still operative. It is a gravity system of 72km of sewers discharging into the sea off Eliot Street.
Two main trunk sewers converge below Eliot Street, through tunnels or holding tanks. These are horseshoe-shaped, about four metres wide and three metres high, constructed in concrete. They allow solids to settle, and lighter matter is discharged over weirs at the end of the tunnels. Levels are such that the high tide does not reach the trunk sewers, but flushes them when the penstocks are opened for de-sludging two or three times a year during strong offshore winds when, as one wag put it, 'the goods are sent to Australia'. For nearly 50 years this outfall system has operated satisfactorily, and sewerage experts have praised Clarke's design as 'utilising nature to its fullest'. Reticula- tion was extended in 1975 at acost of$500,000 to cope with the increased population's terminal needs. Over the years there has been concern that such a system could pollute the shore-line, but medical experts have repeatedly given assurances that there is little or no health problem to the community. As with the water supply, the future of the sewerage system provided much discussion and controversy.
In 1965 the city council and the Taranaki County Council announced ajoint policy which for more than 16 years fuelled the fire between those who favoured a land-based sewerage disposal scheme and the advocates of an ocean outfall scheme. By 1980 the issue was still undecided. Visible evidence of other public services began disappearing in the 1960s. These include power cables and telegraph lines, with their unsightly and cumbersome poles. Each new housing estate developed is "serviced' underground before housing is begun. And so, 'according to plan', development has continued. From a village designed by Carrington for foot and horse-drawn traffic and catering for a population of 9000 (which was not achieved for more than haifa century), New Plymouth has grown to a modern city of more than 37,000 people. There are 13,600 properties, the gross capital value of which is $427,690,090. It is administered by a forward-looking council which employs a staff of 512, for which the annual wage bill is $3,512,250


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