Putting into practice Lenin's slogan "Communism is Soviet power plus the electrification of the whole country" – beginning December 22 - 29, 1920

From the Stalin Society, India's Facebook group, around the Soviet anniversary/holiday Power Engineers' Day:

Vijay Singh shared a post in Stalin Society, India  

 

Yakov Sverdlov  

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102 years ago, on December 22, 1920, the VIII All-Russian Congress of Soviets opened, which adopted a plan for the electrification of Russia - the GOELRO plan.  

The initiator and inspirer of the GOELRO plan was V. I. Lenin. To draw up the plan, a state commission was created, which included over 200 of the best Russian engineers and scientists, headed by G. M. Krzhizhanovsky.  

By December 1920, the commission completed its work. The VIII All-Russian Congress of Soviets, held on December 22-29, 1920, approved the GOELRO plan. In the report at the congress V.I. Lenin, calling the GOELRO plan the second program of the party, put forward an ingenious formula: “Communism is Soviet power plus the electrification of the whole country. Without a plan for electrification, we cannot move on to actual construction ... Only when the country is electrified, when the technical base of modern large-scale industry is provided for industry, agriculture and transport, only then will we finally win. His historic speech V.I. Lenin finished to the thunderous applause of the congress delegates with the following words: "... if Russia is covered with a dense network of power stations and powerful technical equipment, then our economic communist construction will become a model for the coming socialist Europe and Asia."  

The GOELRO plan was designed for 10-15 years and provided for a radical reconstruction of the national economy on the basis of electrification. The plan called for the construction of 30 regional power plants (20 thermal and 10 hydraulic) within 10-15 years with a total capacity of 1,750,000 kilowatts. It was a plan not only for the construction of power plants. On the basis of electrification, a radical technical re-equipment of all branches of industry, transport and agriculture was envisaged, and the task was to transform Russia from an agrarian country into an industrial one.  

The implementation of the GOELRO plan began under the direct supervision of V. I. Lenin. At the cost of enormous effort in the conditions of civil war and economic ruin, the construction of the first-born of socialist electrification was carried out - Shaturskaya, Kashirskaya state district power station and Volkhovskaya hydroelectric power station. The GOELRO plan was fulfilled in terms of the main indicators already by the minimum period for which it was calculated (1931), and by 1935 it was significantly overfulfilled in all the main indicators. Instead of 30 regional power plants, 40 were built. Modern power equipment was installed on them, corresponding to the level of advanced technology of that time. Every year the centralization of electricity production and the capacity of regional power plants increased. The principle of increasing unit capacities, both individual units and power plants, was strictly observed. Already in 1935, there were 13 power plants with a unit capacity of 100 thousand or more kW. By this time, the USSR took second place in Europe and third in the world in this indicator. It should be noted that HG Wells, who again visited Russia in 1934, was amazed at the changes. The plan, which once seemed to him pure fantasy, was overfulfilled, and the country, having overcome the "mist", increased the pace of economic transformation.  

The development of the electric power industry in the USSR did not stop there. It is unthinkable, but already in 1947, after the most terrible and destructive war in the history of mankind, the Great Patriotic War, according to this indicator, the Soviet Union came out on top in Europe and second in the world. Every year, 10 million kW of new power capacities were put into operation - almost six times more than the GOELRO plan outlined for 10-15 years. By the end of the 1980s, the world's largest Unified Energy System (UES) was created in the USSR, which was considered as a special electric power complex of interconnected systems functioning inseparably and developing at a faster pace (compared to other sectors of the economy) in accordance with the needs of society. Its successful development and functioning was possible only in the conditions of socialization of the fuel and energy complex (FEC) industries, related industries of mechanical engineering and transport systems.  

In accordance with the decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR dated May 23, 1966, on the opening day of the VIII All-Russian Congress of Soviets on December 22, 1920, which approved the State Plan for the Electrification of Russia (GOELRO), a professional holiday was celebrated in the USSR - Power Engineer's Day.  

Picture - V.I. Lenin's card GOELRO. VIII All-Russian Congress of Soviets. December 1920. 1957 Artist - Leonid Shmatko