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All Eyes Face South as Region Hovers Near its Own Lights Out by Gail Kinsey Hill, Oregonian staff The Oregonian, January 18, 2001

As blackouts rolled through California on Wednesday, the Northwest's power crisis suddenly became real.

"We're so close to the edge ourselves," said Dick Watson, power planning director for the Northwest Power Planning Council, an organization that helped craft an emergency plan for dealing with electricity shortages in Oregon, Washington, Idaho and Montana.

Energy experts, utility executives and public officials were quick to explain the differences between the problems that face California and those that threaten Northwest. But they stressed -- as they have since just before winter began -- that Oregon and Washington could slip into their own crisis and experience rolling blackouts similar to those that rippled through California.

"We're not immune," said Mark Fryburg, a spokesman for Portland General Electric, Oregon's largest electric utility.

The Northwest has just enough electricity supplies to meet the needs of residential and business consumers, according to recent analyses by energy officials who monitor the region's power grid. If the weather turns unusually cold or a large generator goes down unexpectedly for repairs, as happened in California on Wednesday, the Northwest may find itself in a similar scramble to keep the lights on.

Although the weather turned a little colder this week, forecasts for the next week call for milder temperatures and a little rain.

"That's good news, near-term," said Watson. "But what we really need right now is snow in the mountains" for the summer runoff.

River flows are 75 percent of normal, further worrying Watson and other energy experts.

"You look at the reservoirs, it's scary," Watson said.

In the past, California has shipped electricity to the Northwest in the winter and the Northwest has returned the favor in the summer. This year, California has no surpluses to spare, stretching the Northwest's resources tighter.

"We know we're not going to get anything from California," said John Savage, director of the Oregon Office of Energy. "We've worked that into the equation."

Oregon officials hope that aggressive conservation measures and a little luck with the weather will free up enough megawatts to make up for the lost imports.

Although the California blackouts served as a warning to the Northwest, they did not cause any problems in the region.

Despite a network of power lines and generators that connects the West, rolling blackouts in California do not keep rolling into other states in an electric version of the domino theory. On the contrary, the emergency measure is designed to keep a multistate breakdown of the power grid from happening.

"The whole point of rolling blackouts is to avoid a widespread system collapse," Watson said. "If you've done all you can and you still can't meet demand, it's better to shed load in a controlled fashion that to let the whole system go."

Northwest electricity generators had helped California avert several close calls with blackouts in recent weeks, but didn't have enough electricity to share Wednesday.

Portland-based Bonneville Power Administration, the agency that markets power from 29 federal dams in the Columbia-Snake River Basin, has shipped an average of 375 megawatts of electricity to California between 8 a.m. and 11 a.m. and between 4 p.m. and 10 p.m. The deliveries, enough to serve 375,000 customers, eased the crunch somewhat but not enough to stifle the need for blackouts.

"We did all we could," BPA spokesman Mike Hansen said. "This time it wasn't enough."

In the deal that the BPA has struck with California, the federal agency exchanges rather than sells the power, and it does so on a two for one basis.

Under the terms of the Wednesday transaction, for example, California must return the average of 375 megawatts within 24 hours. Another shipment of the same amount must shoot up transmission lines within two weeks.

The exchange program began in November. At this point, California has returned roughly an equal amount of electricity, and owes the BPA the second increment.

In the emergencies of recent days, the BPA has sent California power supplies identical to those received. The BPA targets its deliveries into Northern California, where the shortages are most severe, and during times of peak demand. Southern California, with a direct transmission line into the Northwest, returns the power when demand eases.

BPA officials said they tried to figure out ways to send California some additional megawatts Wednesday but couldn't do so without endangering their system.

Late Wednesday, California officials gave no assurances that the days ahead would get any easier.

"I'm afraid we just have to play this day by day," said Terry Winter, president and chief executive officer.