The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1922-12-29
DELTA ELECTRIC COMPANY WILL
FURNISH POWER AT LOWER RATES
Granting of SnohOmish County Franchise to be
Considered Next Tuesday by County
Commissioners

Application by Delta Electric &
Water company for a franchise in
Snohomish county, will come before
the county commissioners at Everett
next Tuesday, January 2nd, its hear
ing having been postponed last week
owing to the illness of Commissioner
Peter Henning. The company owns
the land on which it's dam is being
built at Pilchuck, where Booker q
Kiehl, the contractors, already are
on the job.
The Delta company has a fran
chise in Skagit county, where it has
already engaged in more or less con-
struction work on pole lines. Its
announced plans contemplate the de-
velopment of power sites on the
Pilchuck in three separate plants,
having a total capacity Of $4,000
horsepower, about $4,000 horsepower
being provided by the use of Lake
Cavanaugh as a storage reservoir
and the diversion of Deer creek into
said lake.
Frank Mac Kean, president and
general manager of the Delta COM
pany, is a hydro electric engineer
who was employed by the W. B.
Thompson interests in re-surveylng
the Sultan river project in SnohO-
mish county. His previous activities,
it is stated, covered period of 80
years during which he installed va
rious power plants, supervised the
construction of % different dams,
was for three years on the Mississip-
pi river commission, aided in the
construction of the Chicago drainage
canal and was judge of hydro-elec-
trio machinery at the Paris eXposi-
ton.
Mr.. Mac Kean has announced that
the first unit of development will be
about a quarter mile above the con-
crete bridge that spans the Pill
chuck on the main highway between
Arlington and McMurray, where ma
ture has provided a natural power
site, a narrow gorge walled by 270
feet of rock. He plans to develop
10000 horsepower at this plant be-
fore completing the other plants on
the upper Pilchuck which will make
use of Lake Cavanaugh and the
Deer Creek diversion.
Allan R. Moore of Mount Vernon,
field engineer, has for two weeks
been engaged with a crew of men
building road and in other prelim-
mary activities at this dam site
Machinery and construction equip
ment for use by Booker & Kiehl,
Seattle contractors, who will con
struct the dam, has been shipped
from Seattle and it is stated that
they will complete the dam with the
least possible delay, expecting to
have the plant in operation next
May. The contractors took charge
at Pilchuck Wednesday.
This site, it is said, permits of
economical development in three
separate units having an estimated
capacity of 6667 horsepower each,
the first of which involves the cree
ton of a dam n feet high and will
generate enough current to supply
the present needs of farm homes
along its transmission lines in Sno-
homish and Skagit counties and of
Anacortes, to supply which city the
Delta company has made a 25-year
contract
The Delta company has purchased
land that will be overflowed by this
dam, according to Mr.. Mac Kean,
and has established its priority of
water filings on the Pilchuck and
it's tributaries. He lays stress on
the ideal storage and reservoir ia
cilities, which will enable the Del
ta's generators to maintain a steady
output of electric current during the
low-water period of some 80 or 80
days and will to some extent, miti-
gate the troublesome floods along
the Stillaguamish below the mouth
of the Pilchuck.
Reduction of rates and the deliv-
cry of electric current to many COM
munities that have not heretofore
enjoyed this commodity, is promised
by Mr.. Mac Kean who has announc-
ed that the Deltas schedule of rates
will compare favorably with Ia
coma's rates and will be much less
than the rates that have heretofore
prevailed in Snohomish and Skagit
counties. For the present, Mr.. Mac
Kean expects to extend Delta's pole
lines only to those localities that
are without electric current.