広域発電網確立期における都市電力業 : ヴァイマル期フランクフルト・アム・マインを中心に

抄録

This paper examines how municipal electricity services could sustain themselves as autonomous systems under the expansion of wide-area power networks during the Weimar period, the era in which the system of wide-area power networks was established. Its aim is to attempt to introduce an alternative viewpoint, the sustainability of the municipal electricity system, into the study of the history of electricity services in Germany Although a lot of cities came under the control of wide-area power networks in the 1920s, these networks did not completely replace municipal electricity services. This was the outcome of a communal effort, especially in big cities, to maintain their own power stations against wide-area power networks. Frankfurt was a case of such a community. Frankfurt tried not only to enlarge its power station but also to utilize waterpower and brown coal near the city, in order to defend the autonomy of its electricity service against the Rheinisch-Westfalisches Elektrizitatswerk AG (RWE), which aimed to monopolize the electricity service in Frankfurt. These projects constructed an electricity system which enabled the preservation of an autonomous electricity service in Frankfurt. This system went on to function until the second half of the 20th century. But Frankfurt could not achieve such a result by itself. It owed a lot to the assistance of Preussenelektra, the national power company of Prussia. The Prussian government needed to strengthen its relationship with Frankfurt, in order to hinder the expansion of RWE, to integrate the electricity services in Rhein-Main area, and to promote the economic development of Saargebiet. These strategies of the Prussian government strongly influenced the development of the electricity system in Frankfurt.