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Bonneville Power Administration Must Balance Energy Needs with Affordability and Salmon Protections by Tamara Kennedy, Anne Hedges, Bob Jenks and Brad Smith Washington State Standard, July 21, 2026

BPA is legally required to provide reliable and affordable electricity
while also protecting and enhancing fish and wildlife in the Columbia Basin

Travis Kavulla was sworn in as Bonneville Power Administration's newest administrator at the end of June. BPA supplies more than a third of the Northwest's electricity and operates about three-quarters of our region's transmission system. The agency plays an outsized role in the Northwest's energy future and Administrator Kavulla is taking the helm at a pivotal time.

The Northwest's energy future is changing at warp speed, with energy needs growing faster than in decades. BPA has not done enough to meet this major challenge while salmon populations fall deeper into peril. Electricity bills are rising, temperatures are increasing, and snowpack is declining.

BPA is legally required to provide reliable and affordable electricity while also protecting and enhancing fish and wildlife resources in the Columbia Basin under the Northwest Power Act. For decades, our region has enjoyed affordable, abundant, and clean energy supplied by the Columbia Basin hydropower system that BPA manages. But that power has come at a devastating cost to salmon, other natural resources, and Native American tribes.

Fortunately, the challenges now facing the region are balanced by ample opportunities. These include vast and growing clean energy sources like wind, solar, and battery storage, investments and updates that could be made to the region's grid, new ways of maximizing energy efficiency, and a western energy market choice that could help lower the region's energy prices, increase reliability and help unite the region.

Our organizations advocate for clean, affordable, reliable energy alongside climate and environmental protections across the four Northwest states within BPA's core service area. We are optimistic Administrator Kavulla can usher in a new era that rapidly modernizes our region's energy system while better protecting our region's salmon and natural resources that are essential to our economy and ways of life. He is well positioned to make positive change that could unite the Northwest and the other western states served by BPA, but the path ahead will require both bold and well-planned action.

Administrator Kavulla knows these issues well, having worked in both private and public energy sectors in the Northwest, including eight years as a commissioner on the Montana Public Service Commission and a stint with the nonprofit corporation that manages much of the western energy grid. He has a reputation as a thoughtful, innovative leader who could revive the legacy of BPA as a leader in clean, coordinated, and affordable energy while protecting and enhancing our natural resources.

Here are three concrete actions BPA could undertake to address these challenges and usher in a new era of leadership in the Northwest:

• Revisit BPA's 2025 decision to join a day-ahead energy trading system called Markets+. That decision is forecast to increase regional electricity costs by more than $4 billion in the coming decade. BPA's decision would require it to leave the Western Energy Imbalance Market despite WEIM having enhanced reliability and saving BPA customers $127 million since it joined WEIM in 2022. BPA should stay the course with the WEIM and then reconsider whether to join a larger western market called the Extended Day Ahead Market with access to far more renewable energy options that would diversify the system and increase reliability even more.

• Modernize the transmission system. Better connect clean energy generation with the sources of energy demand by upgrading and modernizing BPA's antiquated transmission system. BPA must take a more nimble, efficient, and community-oriented approach to address the massive backlog of pending requests for transmission service so affordable clean energy projects can reliably connect to the grid and meet our growing needs.

• Support and expand BPA's role in developing ways to conserve energy, increase energy efficiency and shift how customers consume energy, thereby reducing the need for expensive new power generation. Helping customers use energy efficiently and flexibly is a win-win solution that will keep bills affordable, improve reliability, and reduce BPA's reliance on our stressed hydro system.