Bpa Absence May Break Circuit Obstacles Could Prevent Agency From Joining Proposed New Power Network

A proposal to integrate much of the West’s vast transmission grid could be submitted to federal regulators by mid-July, but the plan may have a sizeable hole.

Randy Hardy, administrator of the Bonneville Power Administration, said Thursday several legal and policy considerations may prevent the agency from immediately joining a new entity that would coordinate control of wires stretching from Colorado to Canada.

Portland-based Bonneville owns three-quarters of the transmission grid in the Northwest. Its inability to commit those resources to an IndeGO - independent grid operator - would hinder efforts to tie together systems owned or managed by 21 utilities that have so far committed to enlisting.

“It’s very important to find a way to participate in the filing with us this summer,” said Bill Pascoe, an assistant vice president for transmission services with Butte-based Montana Power Co.

Pascoe said IndeGO backers, including Washington Water Power Co., want to get a plan to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in July because approval will likely take a year.

Members would need another year to get organized, he said.

But Hardy said Bonneville must resolve other issues before joining IndeGO.

For example, he said, the agency’s transmission grid is a federal asset, and he is legally barred from handing control of those wires over to private interests.

Also, a comprehensive review of Northwest energy policy conducted last year concluded Bonneville must separate its transmission responsibilities from its role as a seller of power from the region’s federal dams.

The step would help prepare the region for deregulation of the electricity business, which could be authorized by Congress as soon as the end of this year.

Now, Hardy said, obligations imposed on Bonneville by federal legislation contradict the measures necessary to assure its competitiveness.

“We are hopelessly conflicted,” he said.

Other fissures divide Bonneville’s constituents.

John Saven, representing utilities that buy power from Bonneville, said they have been given little input into IndeGO discussions.

If the agency commits to a plan that increases the cost of transmitting power to his member utilities, Saven said, the Portland group will fight “tooth and nail.”

Nancy Hirsh, policy director for the Seattle-based Northwest Conservation Act Coalition, said her group is concerned that transmission rates will be kept too low to sustain regional conservation and fish-recovery efforts.

Separating Bonneville’s transmission and power-marketing duties will be a legal non-starter until those programs are protected, she said.

Hardy and the others were speaking at a board meeting at the Ridpath, trying to ease the Northwest’s transition into a deregulated world where outside interests covet the cheap hydropower that has kept rates to a fraction of those found elsewhere.

Pascoe said trying to find the perfect balance of all regional interests could rob the region of a good plan that staves off attempts by others to tap Northwest megawatts.

, DataTimes