Electric power supply in Western Siberia during the Great Patriotic War (by the example of Novosibirsk, Kemerovo, Tomsk)

During the War Western Siberia took on enormous significance as a rear area. There were evacuations of factories and personnel. The peace-time economy changed over to the defense economy. The manufacturing capacities expansion in Western Siberia required uninterrupted power supply. Firstly, it was necessary to run a big number of evacuated factories. Further, there was a swell in population in the towns of the region. Existing electric power plants were not geared to produce electricity as needed. It raised problems with the electric power supply in Western Siberia. The electric power plant in Tomsk was founded in 1895. There were two electric power plants ahead of the Great Patriotic War in Novosibirsk. The capacity of the heat electric generation plant in Kemerovo also could not produce electricity in the city as needed. Along with this per capita energy consumption grew day by day. It lead to shortage of generated electric power. In this regard it was decided to save electricity. In Tomsk, Novosibirsk and Kemerovo standards on electricity consumption by households, factories, trade organizations, educational institutions, places of entertainment were set to ensure the developing industry with electricity supply. Power consumption restrictions were also set in factories. But the problem could not be solved only due to economizing. Electric power was in short supply. The result was business interruption, power failure. To solve the problem of electricity shortage many active measures were taken for power plant expansion in time of the War: new electric power lines were installed, equipment was repaired and replaced, capacities expansion and repair were provided with extra resources. A big problem in time of the War was the fuel supply of power plants. Shortage caused downtime. Frequent breakdowns of service exacerbated the problem and also lead to power reductions. Taken as a whole, the electric power industry underwent significant changes. During the War stations capacity and generation of electric power increased. Three ways lead to this: placement of evacuated power plants, increase in the capacity of the plants, building of new objects. The result was a power generation scale-up in Western Siberia by the end of the War. Such changes were easy to explain. The productivity of all factories in the region which supplied the whole country directly depended on electric power. Development of electrical energy industry touched the daily living of urban residents in a smaller degree. Power consumption restrictions, long-term power cutoff in houses during the whole War, etc., petroleum lamps, candles, home-made lamps were an integral part of urban everyday life during the War.

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