Soap Lake:

Energy crossroads for the future

SOAP LAKE, Wash.—This little community is distinctive but no longer for its unique blend of mineral waters. Where once the soapy waves of the shallow lake it borders were drawing cards for pleasure seeking city folk, now a more modern drawing card beckons. Though the former resort town straddles the crossroads of two major Columbia Basin highways, it is the crossroads of the future which make it more important.

Even in the sub-zero winter weather, its lake finally laced over with a thin skin of ice, Soap Lake is the geographical heart for a growing alternative energy movement. It is the home of Greg Higgins, solar power advocate, and his partner, architect Graham Hubenthal. Higgins, as one of the leading proponents of dispersal energy forms, ranks in a minority in this state, where solar power has only recently been recognized at all by authorities.

Both are graduates of Washington State University, where Hubenthal is on the faculty. They formed their association early in 1979, setting up an office in the old Soap Lake museum building. The office serves as a model for potential solar customers. Rather than Muzak, the background is filled during the hot Eastern Washington summers with the soft gurgle of a retropack evaporative cooling system—the office remarkably cooler than the rest of this small town. "It's the most efficient way on earth to cool," Higgins said, "and the oldest. The old swamp cooler wins—hands down."

Higgins took his master's work at Columbia University in New York City and then worked for Consolidated Edison, the huge private New York utility firm. "That's where I developed my interest in solar power. I saw the futility of their ways." Although he likes Soap Lake, Higgins admits that business has been slow. "We're a new office. We like being associated with an up-and-coming little town. But we can't be limited to Soap Lake."

The company's clientele are from scattered parts of Eastern Washington. They are designing three houses, with one actually under construction. One is at Moses Lake, one is near Curlew, and the one farthest along is in the Entiat Valley. "The climate offers us a challenge to test around Soap Lake. We're central to the rest of the state," Higgins said, explaining why he located an architectural firm away from a population center.

In town, he has lent his talents to designing a home system—which has exceeded his wildest expectations, helping set up a solar greenhouse at the high school as a learning lab, and providing solar design input to the new senior citizen center, to be built with some grant monies. "I'm personally interested in a solar-powered health spa. That's why I came here originally," Higgins said, referring to the town's resort history.

Solar power is not so drastic that it can't be embraced by most energy conscious homeowners. "It's more difficult, but the principles are simple enough you could add it to a contemporary house. "You need solar input to make sure it's done right—that it's accomplishing its goals. The worst possible use of electricity is for space heating, that's the most inefficient way to heat."

Higgins and Hubenthal, feeling that consumers are more interested in buying the hardware and installing it than in designing a completely solar-oriented building, have set up a referral service in which persons can pay for consulting time and get help with problems. Higgins feels it's just like services offered by many lawyers and hopes it will get the firm through the lean years, until concerted solar development becomes a reality. "People can make bad investments in solar," he cautions. "In any new technology, there are possibilities for deception. It's bound to happen.

"But for the average consumer, that's not a reason to be discouraged, just cautious. The federal government should protect it in such a way to enhance it, not to hinder development," he said, adding that California passed incentives about a year ago and provided for penalties for solar fraud. "The average public knows this is a good hedge against inflation. The public is way ahead. They read Mother Earth News and Solar Age. The government is way behind."

He insists that solar power is as old as history, especially among American Indians. "Only now, we have the advantage of glass—we have new innovations, more sophisticated materials and equipment. We've spent 20 years getting the gadgets to provide our needs," he said explaining that the time is ripe for utilizing full knowledge to combine all the energy sources into a cohesive system.

"Seeing is believing," he said. "That's why these projects are not enough. Right now, we have an opportunity to generate new special programs to allow buildings to become more efficient. Solar is a boon to architecture—architects have always tried to meld the functional with the aesthetic.

"Washington state has the least number of solar installations, according to a survey by the Solar Energy Institute of North America for 1979," said Higgins. "This solar state of the union places Washington 50th. That should be considered an embarrassment. Soap Lake, with four—the high school, the chamber building, the senior center, and Jessie Jackson's house—has almost 10 percent of the Washington State solar installations."

Higgins objects to spending large sums of money to demonstrate massive solar projects which by their very size are impractical. "You can spend easily $1 million but it's absurd. Why? The whole point is that we can reduce costs—reduce waste—use existing technology to do new jobs."

The affable young man, who wears cotton clothing constantly, is usually soft-spoken. His eyes twinkle when he gets excited about his subject but he hardly ever raises his voice. Still. his very lifestyle is a protest against dependence upon increasingly costly energy sources. "Solar power is free, inflation-proof, kicked around for so many years, it's almost an absurd argument. Solar is true value, but it's competing against subsidized power.

"If you compare solar power with today's cost for oil—or electricity—and then compare that with the mixed cost of future nuclear and very low hydroelectric. Compare the cost of nuclear power at five to seven cents a kilowatt hour, not half of mixed hydro, with the cost of solar," Higgins said. "The value of electricity is not a true value.

"Take away the various manipulative tools from the other sources of energy—or give solar power a break. Solar can be used right away, there's not 10-years lead time on a central plant. We're standing at point 'A.' We need to make a decision into the future and not sink huge sums into a Hanford." He explains that he is not anti-nuclear, per se, but feels that many alternatives have been shoved aside, in the headlong rush toward atomic power, which hold as reasonable a chance for success.

Especially in the Pacific Northwest, where abundant, inexpensive hydroelectric power can be used as a back up for the few days when solar heating needs a boost, Higgins is concerned with official attitudes. "It's too bad we're going to nuclear power. Solar and hydro make the Northwest the most energy self-sufficient region in the world. Electricity is a good choice for a back up. Hydro power is great for peaking, during a cold snap or cloudy weather. You can open the gates and produce more electricity. It's stored there for that purpose and it's renewable.

"I think the problem in this state is no leadership from the usual sources. Instead we face cynicism. They're entrenched. A mentality among power planners in the state says 'build more big power plants.' " That may be changing, in part due to Higgins' own efforts. Combining his architectural skills with Hubenthal's, he is trying to advocate the intelligent use of all energy sources.

Author's note: Some energy efficiency and conservation technology has been superceded with newer research and innovation since this article was originally published.

Published by The Columbia Basin Daily Herald, Scripps-Howard League Newspapers, Moses Lake, WA, 98837