History of Power Generation in Niagara Falls - Essay Example

Today both United States as well as Canada is able to enjoy this huge supply of energy due to the efforts of several individuals and companies who recognized the ability of Niagara Falls to supply energy and continued to make efforts to assist mankind. The ability of Niagara Falls to provide unexpected amount of energy was first realized by Daniel Joncaire who started by developing a small sized canal just over the falls to obtain energy for his sawmill (Kurilovitch, 2003, p.3). Later it was realized that the falls had much more to offer and the area was then bought by Augusts as well as Peter Porter during the era of 1805 from the state level government of the New York.

Right after the purchase, the owners increased the size of the canal to obtain huge amounts of power for tannery and gristmill. After a period of nearly 50 years a company named Niagara Falls Hydraulic Power and Mining Company came into existence which was involved in the construction of canals that were later utilized for energy generation. After a period of 28 years the first ever hydro power generating station came into existence under the leadership of Jacob Schoelkorpf. The further expansion of hydro power generation could not take place until the period of 1893 even though efforts were made under the leaderships of Edward Dean Adams and William Thomson during the period of 1890 (Smith, 2011)p.. During the era of 1893 a company named Westinghouse Electric was called upon to design and expand the current power generation and the company ended up developing an AC power system during the period of 1896 and this system was found to be one of the largest electricity generating system of its time.

By the period of 1956 several small scaled power plants that were producing Hydro electricity were operational. But during the period of 1956 a disaster made its way hurting the progress and smaller power