Power plant economics

Three years ago the steam-power plant for the generation of electricity had apparently settled down to an almost uniform arrangement of standard apparatus in which one power plant differed from another only in details of construction of engines, generators, and auxiliaries. As only about twenty years had then elapsed since the first central station Was put in operation on a commercial basis, this uniformity of design seemed to indicate that in the near future it would only be necessary to purchase a standard set of power-plant drawings, and make the necessary changes in size of units in order to have a station of the best type known to the art.