Bonneville Power Administration

The power generated on BPA's grid is sold to public utilities, private utilities, and industry on the grid. The excess is sold to other grids in Canada, California and other regions. Because BPA is a public entity, it does not make a profit on power sales or from providing transmission services. BPA also coordinates with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation to regulate flow of water in the Columbia River and to carry out environmental projects such as salmon restoration.

Although BPA is part of the DOE, it is self-funded and covers its costs by selling its products and services at cost. The BPA provides about 28% of the electricity used in the region. BPA transmits and sells wholesale electricity in eight western states: Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, and California.{{cite web |date=March 2023 |title=BPA Facts |url=https://www.bpa.gov/-/media/Aep/about/publications/general-documents/bpa-facts.pdf |publisher=Bonneville Power Administration |accessdate=June 5, 2024}} Its minimum wholesale rate is 3.49 cents per kilowatt-hour; the BPA generated $4.72 billion in operating revenue in 2022.

BPA now markets the electricity from thirty-one federal hydroelectric dams on the Columbia River and its tributaries, as well as from the Columbia Generating Station, a nuclear plant located on the Hanford Site in eastern Washington. BPA has more than {{convert|15,000|mi|km|0|disp=preunit|circuit }} of electrical lines and 261 substations in the Pacific Northwest and controls approximately 75 percent of the high-voltage (230 kV and higher) transmission capacity in the region. 87 percent of the agency's sustained peak capacity (11,680 MW) is generated from hydroelectricity.

BPA also maintains connection lines with other power grids. It connects to the California high-voltage transmission system by Path 66, which consists of the two 500 kV AC lines of the Pacific AC Intertie, plus a third 500 kV AC line of the California-Oregon Transmission Project (COTP) (managed by the Balancing Authority of Northern California). Together these three lines are operated as the California-Oregon Intertie (COI) (managed by the California Independent System Operator CAISO). An additional DC ±500 kV line, the Pacific DC Intertie, links BPA's grid at the Celilo Converter Station near The Dalles, Oregon to the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) grid 800 miles (1,300 km) away at the Sylmar Converter Station in Los Angeles.

The Northern Intertie crosses the Canada–US border in two locations at Blaine, Washington and Nelway, British Columbia and connects to two BC Hydro AC 500 kV lines and several lower voltage lines.{{cite web| title=BPA to automate transmission curtailment procedure for the Puget Sound Area | date=September 2007 | url=https://www.bpa.gov/news/pubs/FactSheets/fs200709-BPA%20to%20automate%20transmission%20curtailment%20procedure%20for%20the%20Puget%20Sound%20Area.pdf}}

Because BPA owns and operates transmission equipment and locations, its workers perform its own vegetation management.{{cite web | access-date=July 16, 2022 | date=June 23, 2000 | publisher=Bonneville Power Administration, U.S. Department of Energy, Bureau of Land Management (BLM), U.S. Forest Service (FS) | last=Mason | first=Stacy L. | title=Bonneville Power Administration Transmission System Vegetation Management Program Final Environmental Impact Statement (DOE/EIS-0285) | url=https://www.energy.gov/nepa/downloads/eis-0285-final-environmental-impact-statement-0}}

BPA uses helicopters to sling load maintenance workers inspecting and repairing power lines.Head, Elan. "[http://www.verticalmag.com/news/article/OnTheLineTrainingwithBPAandPriority1AirRescue On The Line: Training with BPA and Priority 1 Air Rescue]" Vertical, October 28, 2014. Accessed: October 30, 2014.

The BPA is the designated marketer for 31 hydroelectric dams and the Columbia Generating Station, a nuclear power plant at the Hanford Site. The dams are owned and operated by either the Army Corps of Engineers (21 dams) or the Bureau of Reclamation (10 dams).

The Bonneville Project, named for the then-new Bonneville Dam, was established by an act of Congress that was signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on August 20, 1936. The federal agency was created to market electricity from the Bonneville and Grand Coulee dams based on the model of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). It would provide a flat rate for customer utilities and use revenue from these sales to pay off the bonds used by the federal government to finance the construction of dams in the Pacific Northwest. The agency's name was changed to the Bonneville Power Administration in 1940. Attempts to replace the BPA with a Columbia Valley Authority that more closely resembled the TVA were made in the 1940s and 1950s, but were ultimately unsuccessful.{{cite web |last=Tate |first=Cassandra |date=April 27, 2015 |title=Bonneville Power Administration |url=https://historylink.org/File/11060 |work=HistoryLink |accessdate=June 5, 2024}}{{cite web |title=Bonneville Power Administration: History |url=https://www.nwcouncil.org/reports/columbia-river-history/bpahistory/ |publisher=Northwest Power and Conservation Council |accessdate=June 5, 2024}}

BPA's first industrial sale was to Alcoa in January 1940, to provide 32,500 kilowatts of power.{{cite book|last=MacColl|first=E. Kimbark|title=The Growth of a City: Power and Politics in Portland, Oregon 1915–1950|year=1979|publisher=The Georgian Press|location=Portland, Oregon|isbn=0-9603408-1-5}} This, and the following 162,500 kilowatt order, led to complaints of the Bonneville Power Act's anti-monopoly clause. The cheap price of aluminum from Alcoa helped aluminum sales grow in the post-World War II market.

Overly optimistic estimates of future electricity consumption by BPA in the 1960s led the agency to guarantee some bonds for the disastrous Washington Public Power Supply System nuclear power project. Out of five nuclear power plants started (WNP-1 and WNP-4, WNP-3 and WNP-5), only WNP-2 was completed. BPA is still making payments on three of the abandoned plants. In 2003, BPA's debt for the nuclear project totaled $6.2 billion.[http://www.nwcouncil.org/history/BPAHistory Northwest Council: "BPA History"] www.nwcouncil.org, accessed November 16, 2019

In 1973, the BPA commissioned TRW Inc. to write software for the PDP-10 mainframe computer that managed the agency's power grid; Bill Gates and Paul Allen wrote the software for the monitoring system, which remained in operation until its replacement in 2013.{{cite news |last1=Hair |first1=Calley |last2=Hastings |first2=Patty |date=October 16, 2018 |title=Paul Allen honed his chops in Vancouver for BPA |url=https://www.columbian.com/news/2018/oct/16/paul-allen-honed-his-chops-in-vancouver-for-bpa/ |work=The Columbian |accessdate=June 5, 2024}}{{cite web |title=Legacy computer system retires after keeping the lights on for 38 years |url=https://www.bpa.gov/news/newsroom/Pages/Legacy-computer-system-retires-after-keeping-the-lights-on-for-38-years.aspx |website=Bonneville Power Administration |access-date=November 16, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201112025905/https://www.bpa.gov/news/newsroom/Pages/Legacy-computer-system-retires-after-keeping-the-lights-on-for-38-years.aspx |archive-date=November 12, 2020}}

In 2014, the BPA Library discovered a collection of old films made by the agency and began posting digital versions of them on the agency's website.[https://www.bpa.gov/news/AboutUs/History/Pages/Film-Vault.aspx Film-Vault] www.bpa.gov, accessed November 16, 2019 Included in the collection is the award-winning documentary "River of Power" which covers the Agency's history from its beginning to the present.[http://www.bpa.gov/news/AboutUs/History/Pages/River-of-Power.aspx River of Power (1987) film] www.bpa.gov/news, accessed November 16, 2019

The BPA gives its name to the BPA Trail in Federal Way, Washington, a walking trail built beneath power transmission lines.

In 2025, the BPA was impacted by mass firings of federal workers by the Department of Government Efficiency.{{Cite web |title=Bonneville Power Administration offers jobs back to staff fired by Trump administration |url=https://www.opb.org/article/2025/03/06/bonneville-power-administration-jobs-back-fired-staff-trump/ |access-date=2025-03-10 |website=opb |language=en}}

{{notelist}}

• Tennessee Valley Authority
• Power Marketing Administration
• Western Interconnection
• BPA Trail, Federal Way

{{Reflist|30em}}

• [http://digital.lib.washington.edu/findingaids/view?docId=LuceCharlesF0781.xml Charles F. Luce papers]. 1654–2000. 6.13 cubic feet.
• [http://digital.lib.washington.edu/findingaids/view?docId=AdamsBrock1096.xml Brock Adams papers]. 1947–1993. 326.64 cubic feet (456 boxes).
• [http://digital.lib.washington.edu/findingaids/view?docId=BarkerGeorgePHColl102.xml George H. Barker Collection of Dam Construction Photographs and Ephemera]. 1935-1952. 243 photographic prints, 18 newspaper clippings (1 box).

{{Commons category}}

• {{Official website|1=https://www.bpa.gov/|2=Bonneville Power Administration}}
• [https://www.federalregister.gov/agencies/bonneville-power-administration Bonneville Power Administration] in the Federal Register
• Historic American Engineering Record (HAER) documentation:
• {{HAER |survey=ID-22 |id=id0167 |title=Bonneville Power Administration Burley Substation, 1221 Albion Avenue, Burley, Cassia County, ID |photos=13 |data=19 |cap=2 |link=no}}
• {{HAER |survey=OR-4 |id=or0169 |title=Bonneville Power Administration South Bank Substation, I-84, South of Bonneville Dam Powerhouse, Bonneville, Multnomah County, OR |photos=20 |data=9 |cap=2 |link=no}}
• {{HAER |survey=WA-188 |id=wa0488 |title=Pasco-Kennewick Transmission Line, Columbia River Crossing Towers, Columbia Drive and Gum Street, Kennewick, Benton County, WA |photos=6 |data=14 |cap=1 |link=no}}

{{USGovernment|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090227004010/http://www.bpa.gov/corporate/about_BPA/Facts/FactDocs/BPA_Facts_2006.pdf|archive-date=February 27, 2009|url=http://www.bpa.gov/corporate/about_BPA/Facts/FactDocs/BPA_Facts_2006.pdf|title=BPA Fast Facts - Fiscal Year 2006}}

{{DOE agencies}}

{{Columbia River}}

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Category:Columbia River

Category:New Deal agencies

Category:United States Department of Energy

Category:Companies based in Portland, Oregon

Category:Renewable energy in the United States

Category:New Deal in Oregon

Category:Public utilities of the United States

Category:Water management authorities in the United States