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Show Western Resources Pacific NW power bill gylleleneC. Monberg kiniton-Congress completed " V l9onabill(S885) tohelP 'dfic Northwest thru a regional J mechanism solve its own supply Problems in e Power-:jars Power-:jars ahead. Mark 0. Hatfield, R-Ore., called i "the most important piece of :1 to affect the Pacific Nor-4 Nor-4 since the 1937 Bonneville Act," providing for federal ment of the hydropower of the :.,v Columbia River and its jes. The Senate cleared the bill president's signature on Nov. 19 House passed it on Nov. 17 by Z rollcall vote. 401 has a number of unique !g It provides for the establishes establish-es regional council to be made fpresentatives appointed by the jors of Washington, Oregon, i JD(j Montana to be known as the .Northwest Electric Power and Ration Council. Within two years je Council members have been :ed they are to come, up with "a al conservation and electric pn" for the next 20 years, with jilo be updated every five years. x Council members are to come i "a program to protect, mitigate jiance fish and wildlife" in the .Northwest within the same two-M two-M period. jjwerplan "shall give priority to es which the Council deter-ilo deter-ilo be cost-effective," according (bill. "Priority shall be given: :o conservation, second, to .able resources; third, to ling resources utilizing waste togeneration) or generating ms of high fuel conversion ef-iv; ef-iv; and fourth, to all other s," it provides. ; letter to Chairman Henry M. :i, D-Wash., of the Senate ; Committee dated March 20, 3. Gibbons of the Office of :ogy Assessment observed that ation was considered as a of supply in S 885. "This con-nhaps con-nhaps the most important new yarding power and capacity a of recent years," Gibbons WEVILLE TO ACQUIRE CON FEDERAL POWER son pointed to another unique of the bill as its bottom line, nber to one sentence, the heart regional power bill is the y for the Bonneville Power miration (BPA) to acquire from ( sral entities additional electric k resources, including con-' con-' i, to meet the electric needs of 3 st consumers," he told the "e ion Nov. 19. Heretofore, BPA i emission lines to market the a hydro from the dams on the t a River and its tributaries built ai U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is i Water and Power Resources s i of the Interior Department, or must implement the Council's re to -ld explained, "The bill allows and non-federal power to be (1 and BPA to act as the pool's -ing agent. The pool will not jt '' obligation for future power it BPA is given no authority to en t plants. All future plants will ri -by local utilities. The pool can an ire power from plants owned ii and it cannot acquire more r i : than it has. ..an obligation to h ' Thus the essential utility jse "-ability remains in the local :s Hatfield told the Senate. ob -:id BPA was the logical agent for a power pool for Northwest 5 'because the use of the federal 5 tandem with baseload plants on the enormous storage of the to River System 90 percent of controlled by BPA. It is this n which makes the principles applicable only to the Pacific '8V Hatfield underscored. eviUe will be able to purchase 4 Srtof the output of a new power er.i if it can be matched against ;H BPA contractual obligation Power, he said. This should but ge the money markets to lend p- ''new Northwest power plants, ; spA contract obligations un-"8 un-"8 Part of the supply of new ?' '.wal Northwestern Members ,?ress stated during the House ;.Nov. n and the Senate debate :ks. "But that is not the reason ;"" ,Jls before Congress," Hatfield BILL TO AVERT REGIONAL CIVII, WAR Swift, D-Wash., noted that ,re running high in the Nor-, Nor-, the diminished supply of ( -j in relation to rising te ; e bill is an effort to avert ' 'a wilwar," he told the House rso" ' '' ) M Lt0"tracts start coming j.hil uurenewal next year. JC -!bi" Swift stated, "the VZ locate all of its power , Jr.re8ion's total amount of 3" i,,;1! and administrative ;CMM Challen" and touch off a regional civil war that could last a decade" This means disruption for the region and harm to the national economy. So the first thing the bill does (is that) it solved the federal power allocation crises legislatively rather than having it solved administratively and ultimately by the federal courts," Swift maintained. main-tained. The power allocation has tampered to some extent with the preference clause in the 1937 Bonneville Project Act which gave publicly owned utilities and rural electric cooperatives preference to buy federal power over the investor-owned investor-owned utilities. This has some of the public power groups in the Pacific Northwest cool-to-cold to the bill, but there was no way politically that the clause could remain intact with the rates of federal power so much lower than for non-federal power. Hatfield said the retail rates of private utilities are currently running three times higher than the adjoining public systems because the public systems have access to federal power and the private utilities do not. "This has created substantial political tension," particularly in Oregon where the difference dif-ference was most pronounced, Hatfield stated. So one section of the bill provides power to private utilities for their residential loads, including rural and agricultural customers, " at exactly the same rate as power sold to preference bodies," Hatfield explained. "Since BPA does not have an energy supply," to serve such loads, "the private utilities supply the energy needed. The difference between the cost of power they sell to BPA and the cost of the power they buy back is supplied by the rate power will be sold to the direct-service industries (DSI's)" such as aluminum, chemical and rare metals industries "In turn, BPA can sell power to the DSI's only because of the purchase authority" it has in the bill "which is, then, the essential link to achieving rate parity in the region," according to Hatfield. Jackson pointed out the "preference customers' rates are limited by a rate ceiling in the bill to no greater than what they would have been without the bill. Preference customers and residentual users of electric power are always entitled to the lowest available BPA rate "while commercial and in-1L dustrial consumers generally pay' higher rates, reflecting new resource costs," Jackson explained, under the bill. OPPOSITION AND QUESTION MARKS ABOUT BILL Rep. James Weaver, D-Ore., who carried on what amounted to a one-man filibuster against the bill from Sept. 24 until Nov. 17, when the bill came up under suspension of the rules in the House, fought the bill on the basis of cost. The Eugene Water and Electric Board in Oregon and in Weaver's Fourth District did not like the rate structure. It has low rates now and wants to keep them that way by "developing its own energy sources" outside of the BPA power pool created by the bill, Weaver told the House on Nov. 17. He, Reps. Mike Lowry, D-Wash., and Les AuCoin, D-Ore., maintained the bill would saddle the Pacific Northwest with highly costly base-load power plants, nuclear and coal-fired. AuCoin called the bill "a gold-plated invitation" in-vitation" to utilities to construct unsafe, un-safe, environmentally unsound and very costly powerplants. They opposed the "melding" of costs of the new plants with the low cost federal power on grounds that this was . a deterrent to rather than an incentive for conservation. But their opposition was in the minority in the Pacific Northwest. Neither side sought a federal subsidy. Efforts to keep the number of legal challenges down won't eliminate them, Rep. Thomas S. Foley, D-Wash., one of the prime sponsors of the bill, candidly told the .House on Nov. 17. Altho legal challenges over BPA contracts cannot be sustained, he conceded the bill did not foreclose "litigation over rates, over new (power) resources and over the meaning of many provisions that have been added to the bill largely in order to reassure the bill's critics." Among the question marks posed by the bill are the requirements to maintain minimum stream flows to protect the fish in the Columbia River System. This is expected to be a problem in the Upper Snake River. Conservation of fish and wildlife is "placed on a par" with other purposes of the legislation, Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., D-Mich., told the House on Nov. 17. He fathered the provision in the bill. But it . appears to be in conflict with another provision . added by . Rep. Steven ,,, ,,Synnrns,,R-Jd3hp,.staUngi.1that.. the. bill or does not adversely affect "any existing water rights." There are other seeming inconsistencies in the bill. visit her grandparents often. Clarence Ross is in Salt Lake where he underwent surgery in the Holy Cross Hospital last week. He is reported as doing fine and hopes to be home soon. Carma Lee Werner and baby visited over the week with her parents and family the Kelly Powells. She came for her sister's wedding and returned home to Arizona after Thanksgiving. Little Tyler Hewitt spent Thanksgiving day in the hospital overcoming a bout with pneumonia. His great grandfather, Lute Stewart was in there also. They are both reported better and will be home this week. The Larry Peterson's had a huge family gathering in for the big Turkey Day. To accommodate this crowd they rented the recreation hall to serve their guests. The Jack Ruppe family and the Lorn Ruppe's traveled to Las Vegas, Nev., over the weekend to watch their son and brother, Scott, who participated in the college wrestling tournament. ii jirwi lu-i . in i ru)niT i i ii ij t-.unt.i hi -'J Eugene and Wilbert Woody went with : Robert Bia to Arizona where their families gathered for the holiday. |