Bpa Asked To Reassess Budget Cuts Panel Considers Modifying Initial Recommendations
Members of a panel that proposed $159 million in potential budget cuts for the Bonneville Power Administration on Wednesday indicated they might modify reductions in conservation and alternative energy spending.
Witnesses at a Spokane hearing on the plan released last month also asked them to reassess other recommendations.
“Too many proposals simply shred the fabric of Bonneville,” said Bill Arthur, Northwest regional director for the Sierra Club.
He said conservation and wildlife programs are a key part of public power. If Bonneville’s goal is just selling the cheapest electricity, he said, the federal power-marketing agency might as well be sold to a private utility.
“There are public responsibilities that need to be maintained,” agreed panel member Mike Kriedler, one of Washington’s representatives on the Northwest Power Planing Council.
He said the panel would re-evaluate rollbacks in conservation when they prepare final recommendations Feb. 23.
The proposed cuts in conservation and renewable energy programs total $22.4 million, about 13 percent of a package that also suggests Bonneville cut overhead, marketing and debt costs, shrink the Power Planning Council budget, and reallocate expenses between its marketing and transmission operations.
About one-quarter of the savings - $48 million - would come from improved cooperation between Bonneville and its two primary power suppliers. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Bureau of Reclamation operate the federal dams on the Columbia and Snake rivers.
Another 11 percent - $19 million - would result from freeing the Washington Public Power Supply System Nuclear Plant No. 2 to sell its own power instead of allowing Bonneville to handle the chore.
Bonneville’s annual budget runs more than $1.9 billion. The agency markets 40 percent of all the electricity used in the Northwest, mostly to public utilities.
The Cost Review Management Committee was formed last summer to squeeze Bonneville’s budget because other power suppliers have been able to undercut BPA in recent years.
All of the agency’s existing power contracts expire in 2001. Customers will be able to buy electricity from anyone they choose.
Representatives of several utilities that are now Bonneville customers said they plan to stick with the agency, but made clear they won’t be taken for granted.
“We have to have lower costs,” said Mike Henry, general manager of the Lincoln Electric Cooperative in Eureka, Mont.
Bob Crump, general manager of Kootenai Electric, noted that utility reduced its purchases from Bonneville because of the rate uncertainties created by fish and wildlife expenditures, which the cost-cutting panel was not charged to consider.
“We’re spending a lot of money and not getting a whole lot to show for it,” he said.
, DataTimes