The Kennewick courier-reporter. [volume] (Kennewick, Wash.) 1914-1938, 1925-03-05

Perhaps the best piece of news that
has been sprung in Kennewick since
the ''big freeze" is that of the start
ing On construction work On the great
500, 100000 Priest Rapids hydroelec-
trict power project on the Columbia
river fifty miles above Kennewick
when it was announced In Washing
ton, DC. that the Federal Power Com
mission had acted favorably on the
long-pending application of the Wash
company for a license to make the
ington Irrigation & Development
development.
The Washington Irrigation e. De-
velopment company, incorporated in
this state, is holding company for
the General Electric company of New
York, which for several years has
been known to be behind the Priest
Rapids project. Seattle representa-
tives of the development company
confirmed the announcement made by
the press dispatches that the develop
ment license has been granted, but
said they had not been informed
when the work. would start.
1t is matter of common knowledge
in the electrical world, however, that
when the license was applied for near
fy year ago it was the intention
of the financiers represented by the
General Electric company to begin
work on the power plant as soon as
the license was issued and complete
the development within about thirty
months from the start of the work.
The Priest Rapids project is the
largest in America, completed or pro-
posed, with the exception of the in
stallation at Niagara Falls, and is
planned to develop 400, 900 horsepower
at all stages of the Columbia river,
which will be spanned by $28, ,000,-
600 dam two and one-half miles long
to create the power reservoir. The
dam will be the longest in the world
and ninety feet high and plans for
the power installation call for the
expenditure of $17,000,000 more for
turbines. dynamos and other cleo
trical machinery.
The outstanding feature Of the plan,
however. is the announcement Off
cially made by the General Electric
company group some months ago that
$55, ,OO0,0O more will be spent in
building on what is now a barreen,
sagebrush plain, model and complete
industrial city that will have a pop
uation of about $4,000 and where
scores of basic products, including
aluminium. copper alloys, nitrates, ex-
plosives and fertilizers will be manu-
factured by electro-chemical process
es and distributed to all parts of the
world.
In short the General Electric Com
pany and the capitalists who are in
terested with it, propose to make
Priest Rapids, which lies almost in
the geographical center of the state
of Washington and in the heart of
the great Columbia Basin, second
Niagara Falls and to exceed anything
that has ever been promised by Henry
Ford or anybody else for Muscle
Shoals.
Niagara Falls has primary power
output of 500 900 horsepower, as COM
pared with 100000 horsepower for
Priest Rapids, but the Priest Rapids
project is intended to develop at high
stages of the Columbia river, $50, 600
additional or secondary horsepower
making its total output at these stag
es larger than that of Niagara.
In every way Priest Rapids dwarfs
the much-talked-of Muscle Shoals
project, which can develop only 250,-
900 horse power the year around and
CSC, 900 horsepower at high stages OF
water.
The thing that makes the Prizes;
Rapids project unique and that prom.
ises an epoch-making industrial de.
velopment for this state and the en-.
tire Pacific Northwest is that the
General Electric company group has
planned and Snanced the entire pro
ject with the purpose of using the