Snoqualmie Falls Power Plant.
Snoqualmie Falls, 270 Feet High.
The colossal power plant at Electron is not the only enterprise of its kind that is contributing to the industrial growth of Tacoma. The Cascade Mountains are the source of many rivers which have filed out deep canyons and here and there plunge over lofty precipices seeking ocean level in Puget Sound not many miles away. The first of the waterfalls in the foothills of the Cascades to be harnessed to generate electric power for transmission to the Puget Sound cities was Snoqualmie Falls, 270 feet in height, or nearly twice as high as the falls of the Niagara River. A plant generating 10,000-horse power was installed at Snoqualmie Falls about four years ago, a large share of the product of which is transmitted to Tacoma, forty-four miles distant, where it is employed for city lighting and important industrial purposes, such as supplying power to the Tacoma Smelter, Tacoma Grain Company’s flour mills, and many other manufacturing enterprises.
- 1—Union Club House.
- 2—Telephone Exchange.
- 3—Sheard Building.
- 4—New Public Library.
A fire destroyed the transformer house at the Snoqualmie Falls power plant September 20, 1903. A new fire-proof transformer house has been erected in which four transformers of 2,500 kilowatts, or about 3,300-horse power each, have been installed in place of a battery of thirteen 550 kilowatt transformers, thus increasing the capacity of the transformers by more than 4,000-horse power.
The product of the Snoqualmie power plant was in use up to its limit when the fire of September, 1903, occurred, and the Tacoma Cataract Company, distributors of the Snoqualmie power in this city, had already begun the construction of an auxiliary steam power plant on the tideflats at Tacoma, which was completed and placed in operation December 20, 1903. It adds 1,500-horse power to the product of the Snoqualmie Falls power plant employed at Tacoma.