Sierra Nevada Region

FY 2006 Profile Capacity:         2,103 MW*  Energy sales: 10, 086,898 MWh* Powerplants: 11  Transmission (in circuit miles): 865  Substations: 21  * Includes the Central Valley Project    and the Washoe Project

The University of California at Davis, the City of Redding, Calif., and the Trinity County Public Utilities District are a few of the varied customers that the Sierra Nevada Region serves with hydroelectric power. Whether the need is for lighting campus residence halls, providing power to support scientific research or ensuring that the streets are well lighted for public safety, our goal is to serve customers  reliably.

The Sierra Nevada Region is one of four regions of Western Area Power Administration, a Federal power marketing agency. Western sells wholesale power and bulk wholesale transmission to local utilities and Federal end-use entities. Your power provider gets the power it delivers to consumers from a variety of sources, including wholesale power providers such as Western, its own generation resources or purchases of additional energy from others. Sierra Nevada employees work around the clock to keep bulk power moving through the interconnected transmission system so that electricity ultimately reaches your home or business.

Delivering power
The Sierra Nevada Region carries out Western's mission of providing power to public entities at the lowest cost possible consistent with sound business practices. The region sells and delivers power to cities and towns, rural electric cooperatives, public utility and irrigation districts, Federal research installations, educational institutions and prisons in northern and central California. These customers have a priority, or preference under Federal law, to receive Federal power. Most power that the Region sells is generated by powerplants of the Central Valley Project, which are owned and operated by the Bureau of Reclamation. The principal power generating facilities are located at Shasta, Folsom, Trinity and New Melones dams. We import additional power over Western's share of the Pacific Northwest-Pacific Southwest Intertie and the California-Oregon Transmission Project--500-kV lines linking northern and central California to the Pacific Northwest. After meeting project use load, CVP firm power serves the equivalent of the annual electrical needs of 650,000 Californians. We sell about 10 billion kilowatthours of power in an average water year.

Selling and delivering those electrical resources is the Sierra Nevada Region's main business. We also serve these customers by operating and maintaining 21 substations and 865 miles of 69- to 500-kV transmission lines, including the Path 15 Upgrade from Los Banos to Gates in Central California.  Of those 865 miles of line, 807 miles are 230-kV. 

Providing services
In the Sierra Nevada Region, we provide our customers with diverse services. For example, we provide technical assistance through the Energy Services Program, such as infrared scanning for energy leaks, efficient lighting or demand-side management, and we help customers plan for future power needs. We also provide scheduling coordinator services-matching loads and supplies for customers-and communicate information to the control area. If customers desire new products and services, we are open to exploring their ideas.

To serve customers, Sierra Nevada employees ensure that the transmission facilities are maintained and operated reliably and conform to industry standards; participate meaningfully in regional transmission planning forums to identify and plan for future needs; participate in the planning and construction of new transmission infrastructure projects to improve reliability and service as needed; ensure that transmission services are offered to new and existing customers on an open access/nondiscriminatory first-come, first-served basis; ensure environmental protection; establish and monitor employee safety and system security policies; manage administrative functions, such as property management and information services; schedule power and handle customer billing; analyze hydroelectric resources; ensure system maintenance; administer contracts and set rates; provide technical assistance regarding efficient energy use; and oversee finances and budgeting. 

Operating from five duty stations throughout Northern California, including the regional office in Folsom, Calif., we work at the forefront of technological advances and amid unprecedented change in the electric utility industry.

With many diverse players competing in the electric utility industry to buy and sell power, we will build upon our products and services in the Sierra Nevada Region to meet customer needs. Our goals are to maximize the net hydropower available from the CVP to market to preference power customers; continue to provide value-added, cost effective customer services to help us keep pace with the new industry; and assure our ability to repay project obligations. To help achieve these goals, we are taking steps to affirmatively implement cost containment measures to minimize cost escalations on projects, as well as reduce costs in less strategically valuable areas. 

Eyeing the future
Our future also depends on our interactions with other players in the industry. For instance, cooperative ventures with other California entities are common throughout our service territory.

Being flexible to changes in the industry, enhancing our existing relationships and improving service will shape our future in the Sierra Nevada Region. We look forward to building upon our existing relationships and creating new ones.