The power of water

As early as Roman times, water wheels powered grain mills and water pumping stations in what is now Switzerland. The water wheels, made of wood, were the only propulsion engine besides wind power and human or animal muscle power. Water power was used for commercial purposes, for example in sawmills or hammer forges, and in early industrialization to power spinning, twisting and weaving machines.

Hydropower provided useful services, especially in the electrification of Switzerland. Turbines are used to convert the kinetic energy of water into rotational energy, which causes the turbine shaft to rotate. This rotation is used to drive a generator to produce electricity.

Hotel pioneer Johannes Badrutt (1819-1889) was so fascinated by the electric lighting system on display at the 1878 Paris World Exhibition that he commissioned a water turbine in St. Moritz that same year. As a result, on July 18, 1879, the first electric light in Switzerland burned in the old dining room of the St. Moritz Hotel Kulm.

Electricity represented progress and prosperity. It is not surprising that by tram Vevey-Montreux-Chillon Switzerland’s first electric train also operated in the tourist-oriented region around Lake Geneva. With the Lötschbergbahn and the Rhaetian Railway Electrification was also achieved on larger railways.

Switzerland caused an early stir with its records: in 1872 the first concrete dam in Europe was built near Pérolles south of Freiburg, in 1921 the first arch dam in Europe (Montsalvens) and in 1924 in the Wägital, the highest flood defense in the world at 111 meters. However, coal remained by far the most important energy source. In 1910, electricity only accounted for about 3.5 percent of total energy consumption in Switzerland. Since Switzerland has virtually no coal reserves of its own, it had to be imported from abroad.

This foreign dependence was especially evident during the First World War. After the end of the war we continued. The SBB electrified its railway lines and built its own hydroelectric power stations: With Ritom (1920) in the canton of Ticino and Amsteg (1922) in the canton of Uri, the Gotthard line was electrified and from May 28, 1922 the entire route was electrified. from Lucerne to Chiasso was continuously powered by electricity.

The electrification of the SBB was of great importance for the young electricity industry and for the entire country at the beginning of the 20th century. In the interwar period, hydropower became a matter of national importance, with electricity as ‘white coal’ contrasted with the black ‘dirty coal’ of foreign countries.

After the Second World War, the hunger for energy increased. Several areas were electrified and electrical household appliances and heating appliances were popular consumer goods in the post-war period. In 1956, 17 power stations were under construction in Switzerland, mainly in the Alpine cantons. The construction of the new dam Great Dixence from 1951 to 1965 in Valais was the embodiment of a gigantic hydroelectric project and in many respects a superlative building.

The dams, which grew to dizzying heights, helped create a Swiss myth. After the country’s reputation suffered during World War II, hydropower flattered Switzerland’s collective consciousness: a small nation in the center of Europe managed to tame water and transform a hostile nature into the friendliest of all energies thanks to the countless machine inventors and engineers who can use them for the development of the country.

The implementation of the hydropower projects and the construction of the dams required advanced logistics. Additional roads, a concrete factory, warehouses for the large quantities of materials, housing and other buildings for the workforce had to be built on site.

The power station, which is difficult to reach from a traffic perspective Linth-Limmern in Glarnerland the construction of cable cars was necessary to transport building materials to almost 2000 meters above sea level. Two trams from the Zurich public transport company transported the workers to the construction site as “stollent trams”.

Hydropower projects also repeatedly occupied intergovernmental relations. In certain cases, the construction of dams and the development of water resources even made it necessary to expand the national border – as happened with Italy in 1953 and with France in 1963.

The work in the high mountains demanded everything physically and mentally from the mostly Italian workers. They were also not spared from accidents. When building the Mattmark Dam In 1965, falling ice in the canton of Valais buried 88 people, mainly Italian workers.

Switzerland is considered the moated castle of Europe. Despite ideal conditions, the integration of hydropower into the Swiss energy system was by no means an absolute success. It was characterized by a continuous negotiation process and often ended with a good Swiss compromise. In the sometimes emotional debates, both proponents and opponents referred to abstract ideals such as the common good or nature to argue for or against hydropower projects.

Some projects had to deal with strong winds. In the 1940s there was talk of building a dam in the Urseren Valley in the canton of Uri. If it were built, about 2,000 people would have to move to the reservoir. After peaceful protests, the pent-up anger was released on February 9, 1946 during the “Night of the Riot”. That night, the angry Andermatters threatened to throw the senior engineer over the Devil’s Bridge and destroyed an architectural firm involved in the project.

After the implementation of several other projects, the euphoria about hydropower faded somewhat in the late 1960s. Switzerland also relied on building nuclear power plants to generate energy. Increased environmental regulations delayed the realization of projects. To this day, hydropower remains ambivalent from an environmental perspective: conservationists complain about landscape disruption and biodiversity loss.

Environmentalists, on the other hand, see it as one of the most sustainable forms of electricity generation and an important tool for climate protection. The fact is: reservoirs are not only reliable suppliers of renewable energy, but are also giant energy storage devices and can make a significant contribution to bridging the winter energy gap.