Electric power industry The world's first public electricity supply was provided in late 1881, when the streets of the Surrey town of Godalming in the UK were lit with electric light. This system was powered from a water wheel on the River Wey, which drove a Siemens alternator that supplied a number of arc lamps within the town. This supply scheme also provided electricity to a number of shops and premises to light 34 incandescent Swan light bulbs. Additionally, Robert Hammond, in December 1881, demonstrated the new electric light in the Sussex town of Brighton in the UK for a trial period. The
History of electricity supply in Queensland in 1949, the supply to the Darling Downs area being boosted with the construction of the first 110 kV line from the CEL network to Postmans Ridge (near Toowoomba) in 1950. In 1953, the SECQ was regionalised, with the Southern Electricity Authority (SEA) immediately acquiring CEL and installing Queensland's first peak load power stations, both 10 MW units, at Abermain (on a coalfield north of Ipswich) and on the site of the Tennyson Power Station, then under construction by the Brisbane City Council. CEL had also been constructing a new power station, Bulimba B, which opened the following year, and