Pena Answers Nw Worries On Bpa, Fish

Northwest lawmakers questioning President Clinton’s nominee for energy secretary got the favorable answers they were looking for during his Senate confirmation hearing Thursday.

The Bonneville Power Administration won’t be sold, the Columbia River’s dams are staying in place and cleanup of nuclear waste is a high priority, Federico Pena said.

“There is no intention, no plan to sell the Bonneville Power Administration,” Pena testified before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.

“I am very much aware of the unique aspects of Bonneville and the four states that are served by that important institution,” he said. The states are Montana, Idaho, Oregon and Washington.

“We will do our very best to be sensitive to the Bonneville situation because it has unique challenges and problems,” he said.

Pena also said he opposes proposals to remove dams on the Snake and Columbia rivers as a way to help save endangered Northwest salmon stocks from extinction.

“I think the dam system has worked well, a very important part of our (energy) system,” he said.

Pena responded to several questions from the three Northwest members of the committee, Sen. Slade Gorton, R-Wash., Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Gordon Smith, R-Ore. Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, also serves on the panel.

Smith pressed Pena about the dams, saying he too opposes any removal of the hydropower generators. Other than the dams, Pena said the fate of Northwest salmon “is a very controversial area, very complex.”

“I don’t have any particular opinion at the moment to change any particular policy today,” he said.

Wyden tried to push Pena even further on the question of the administration’s opposition to the sale of BPA, noting that backers of the sale likely would include it as a way to raise money to offset other costs as part of a proposal to balance the federal budget.

Is it the administration’s position, Wyden asked, that a balanced budget proposal including the sale of BPA would be unacceptable?

“To the best of my information, that is the administration position,” Pena said.

He said cleanup of nuclear waste at the Hanford nuclear reservation and other DOE sites will continue to be a priority.