On July 2, 1703, Shipu Mining House.

The sunset fell in the courtyard that had been around for a while, and many mottled trees were left. It was already late autumn, and the impotences planted in the corner of the courtyard had already withered, and only the weeds that stubbornly poked their heads from the cracks at the base of the wall were still standing proudly, adding a hint of green to the courtyard.

There were traces of repair everywhere on the cement floor, and several workers of age were cleaning the yellow and fallen leaves dancing in the wind on the ground. At night, Director Kong, the General Administration of Precious Metals, and his group came over. Everyone had to deal with hygiene issues before getting off work, so as not to be unpredictable.

There is still a rhythmic sound of machine collisions in the workshop more than ten meters away. Old workers know that it is the hydraulic machinery in the casting workshop stamping coins. Yes, yes, it is hydraulic machinery! As a coin minting company that has been quite old, Shipu Coin is still using hydraulic stamping equipment designed decades ago to create metal currency. For this reason, their factory also has a power channel that communicates with Shipu Reservoir to drive various machines. But this canal is as old as this factory. Even though it is often maintained, repaired, and silted, it is still unstoppable. In today's ever-changing technology, hydraulic machinery that once represented advanced productivity has indeed fallen behind.

Shipu Mint Institute once applied for special funds from the General Administration of Precious Metals Administration for modernization of production lines. They planned to introduce a full set of steam production lines from the Heishan Industrial Company to improve production efficiency. However, the superiors did not allow it. The factory brought it up several times and was rejected, and the coin tasks assigned to them were less and less. It seemed that the General Administration had focused all its energy on the mint in Qingdao Port, which was particularly depressing.

Recently, Shipu Mining Office proposed to introduce a steam production line, but it was rejected if nothing unexpected happens. The senior management of the factory received news that their Mining Office is likely to be closed because there is not so much metal currency demand now, and the State Administration of Precious Metals Management has devoted itself to the printing and management of paper currency.

At present, Shipu Minthouse only has cent coins (steel, nickel alloy) and a small amount of gold coins per month. The cent coins are widely circulated in China, and the main force used by the people on a daily basis still has some demand. The gold coin minting business is purely taken care of them. The face value of Wu Shiyuan and 100 yuan is basically not circulated on the market. It is mainly prepared for those who receive gold coin coupons to exchange for gold. The demand is certainly not small, but with the new coin factory in Fangshan County (near the gold production area), the production capacity is high, so what is the Shipu Minthouse? Giving you some business is purely care-oriented, after all, gold nugget transportation also costs.

As a result, the Shipu Mint House, which has a long history, has reached the end and is facing the embarrassing situation of closure. Fortunately, the workers have basically arranged their places to go, either to the factory in Qingdao County or to the newly built factory in Daxing County. Most people chose the latter because it is a new factory mainly for printing banknotes, and is currently in the process of building construction. Everyone has the opportunity, which is much better than the old factories with fixed personnel.

By the way, the production line of the Daxing Mint will be mainly powered (but a steam production line is retained for backup), but the premise is that the large hydropower station under construction on the Daxing Reservoir can be successfully completed.

The hydropower station was established two years ago. The investment amount in the first phase exceeded 3 million yuan of fiat currency. To be honest, no one knows how much investment will be added in the future. The East Coast has never had any experience in construction of this kind of project. All designs are theoretical and will definitely encounter countless difficulties in practice. Many people pessimistically predict that this project will take at least ten years to complete, and the investment of more than 10 million yuan is less. It will definitely become a long-term loss of blood in the national finance, allowing people to see what the outcome is.

Of course, they also admit that electricity is the future energy and represents the development direction of advanced productivity. But they also emphasized that is the current national strength of the East Coast to support such a large-scale project? The east coast of the Daxing Reservoir has been built for 20 years, and there is only one prototype. The amount of funds required to be invested is amazing. If this part of the cost is also converted, the cost of this hydropower station will be as high as the sky.

Moreover, a large amount of manpower and material resources are still being used in China to build the Heihe (Negro River) reservoir. It is also a bottomless pit for gold swallowing, and the two lines are being started at the same time. Can the national financial support be supported? Do you need to increase taxes nationwide?

These are very realistic problems. Especially, although the East Coast has not officially joined the Spanish War of Succession, it has been preparing for the war and actively preparing, and the annual expenditure is extremely large. In this case, it will squeeze out a large amount of funds to launch the Daxing Reservoir Project. Even if the finance can bear (print money...), will it cause great inflation in the country? War and infrastructure have always been the best driving forces of inflation!

This is the opinion of opponents, but in fact there are many supporters. Their reason is that the gold production in the Tuanjiehe Gold Mining Area is growing rapidly, and the population and economic scale of the east coast have developed to a new level. Appropriately increasing the money supply will not cause any economic disaster. Or even if there is, it can be overcome! Moreover, large reservoirs have started to invest twenty years ago, and have gradually invested more than 10 million yuan in funds, materials and labor costs. It is better to take this opportunity to increase investment and build this reservoir, which can not only reduce flood disasters in the upstream and downstream, but also regulate the water supply of the reservoir during dry seasons or drought years, and reduce losses to agricultural production. This is a lot of benefits.

Furthermore, so much manpower and material resources have been invested, isn’t it a big waste to be idle? Each one is calculating costs. If the investment is calculated, the capital cost will be ignored? Now that the construction of the Heihe Reservoir has not officially started, it is still time to stop the "cliff" and it is better to save the funds and invest all of them in the construction of the Daxing Reservoir. As long as it is completed, not only will the people on both sides of the Wujiang River benefit greatly, but the construction of the hydropower station can also be followed up to contribute to the economic development and scientific and technological progress of the East Coast Republic.

They also pointed out that the current Heihe Reservoir project is purely a project that local officials on the East Coast prairie, who have used their huge influence among the government's top management to compete for. This is of course crucial to local interests, but from a national perspective, it is not the highest priority. If the government has sufficient funds, it is not a must for the two major projects to be launched at the same time. However, if funds are short, then you can consider suspending the Heihe Reservoir project and making every effort to tackle the Daxing Reservoir. After all, the power generation potential here is much greater than that of the Heihe Reservoir.

As the largest and only power company in China, Donggang Power Company also appears and plays a huge role that many people can't imagine. As the biggest beneficiary of power promotion and application, Ma Xiaopeng really made great efforts to promote the Daxing Reservoir and Heihe Reservoir power station projects, and even mobilized many relationships between his parents and consumed countless favors, which finally made this project gain a glimpse.

After so many years of hard work, Dongpin Company finally survived the hardship stage of only producing batteries, power measurement instruments, and experimental power generators (strictly speaking, the latter two belong to the "textbook" category), and began to enter a beautiful era of applying electricity. How could he not seize this opportunity? He is not young anymore and does not want to continue waiting indefinitely. He wants to see the widespread application of new energy, such as electricity, when he is alive.

To this end, he first formed an alliance with the Bai family's Guangming Lamp Company, and also cooperated in depth with machinery companies such as Heishan Industrial Company, Tieling Heavy Industry Consortium, Ping An Coal and Steel Consortium to promote the development of the electric machine tool industry. Then he reached a comprehensive strategic partnership with salt chemical companies to gradually increase the share of electricity in the East Coast energy map.

At present, there are more than a dozen small coal-fired power stations across the country (mostly established in cooperation with state-owned enterprises). Although the total power generation is still not worth mentioning and the power stations are not connected to the network, it is already an amazing achievement.

Now, Ma Xiaopeng has greater ambitions, that is, to find a way to promote the construction of a large hydropower station, which is much better than a small-scale enterprise self-use power station. It is for the society and is not at the same level at all. Moreover, after the large hydropower station is built, there is another huge benefit, that is, you can set up a transmission network by yourself. As long as a large number of users are connected to the power grid, it is a gold-crawling machine, and the value is self-evident.

East Coast Power Company has such technical reserves. Their company has been developing for decades. In addition to normal production, it also has a large R&D institution. In addition to the enterprises, the funding source of this institution also has the special funds for the "Science Spring Plan". In addition, it has a close cooperative relationship with the Engineering and Technology Research Institute. The two parties have joined forces to study the technologies and equipment required for power generation, transmission and distribution, and have been verified and improved in the use of small power stations. The strength cannot be underestimated.

Ma Xiaopeng is now very confident that as long as the large-scale hydropower station project does not go wrong, his company will become the darling of the new era, and Ma Xiaopeng will also become the storm of the times. He has even tasted the taste in his mind in advance for many years.

The only obstacle now is probably money. Damn, why are you so unafraid of it? At such a critical moment, you have to participate in a huge global war? Now the Army is trying to get a full twelve mixed regiments. The Navy said that we have a new idea and want to build several new armored warships. The diplomatic and intelligence departments are constantly applying for various funds so that they can thrive in diplomacy and plan various shameful conspiracies. They are simply a group of bandits!

A few days ago, a news from the Caribbean Sea gave him a certain bad premonition, that is, the new Spanish king Philip V actually sent a general to Florida with more than a thousand soldiers. It is said that he wanted to attack the restless aristocrats in the local area and suppress independent elements, which almost detonated the relationship between the East and the West.
Chapter completed!