Background
This course was created in 1984 at the request of the Administrator of the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) and has been offered annually ever since. For many years, BPA, Northwest utilities, the Energy Trust of Oregon, Northwest Energy Efficiency Alliance, state energy agencies and public utility commissions, law firms with a significant presence in the energy sector, energy consulting companies, advocacy organizations and coalitions, and other energy companies and agencies have encouraged and supported employees that these organizations have identified as future leaders to participate in this course. This participant mix leads to lively and informative class discussions. In fact, by participating in this class, employers have identified and recruited excellent future employees, and students have found excellent jobs in this fascinating field. Many of the Northwest’s most respected energy leaders enrolled in this course earlier in their careers. Many have generously returned as guest speakers to help us prepare the next generation of energy leaders. BPA administrators have established a tradition of joining us as the concluding guest speaker to explain how he or she is attempting to balance the energy policy and management opportunities and challenges that BPA and the Northwest region are contending with and that we have explored in previous class sessions. BPA’s current Administrator, John Hairston, or its Chief Workforce and Strategy Officer, Dan James, have been invited to join us as the course’s final guest speaker. John’s or Dan’s presentation, “Where the Rubber Meets the Road: The Views of the BPA Administrator” will discuss how they perceive and are addressing many of the same challenges and opportunities we will explore in this course.
Energy drove the industrial revolution and is driving the post-industrial revolution as well. Call centers, mobile phones, and quantum computers all share the need for reliable energy supplies. When combined, the transportation, building, and industrial energy industries create, by far, the largest economic sector in the world. Because of its socio-economic importance, as well as its substantial environmental footprint, the energy industry is heavily regulated and governed.
Against this backdrop, the electricity sector is undergoing especially turbulent times as traditional business models are being altered due to renewable energy targets, climate change legislation, and energy efficiency and distributed generation requirements. Utilities are being required to deliver renewable electricity to their customers, but the challenge of transporting the renewable electricity from rural to urban areas is increasingly difficult due to citizen and environmental opposition to new power lines.
Energy policy in the Northwest is quite different from other parts of the country. There are many reasons for our region’s “energy exceptionalism”. Here are nine of the most important ones:
- The Northwest’s power system is still dominated by hydroelectricity (although to a much lesser degree than a generation or two ago).
- Our region’s energy system is still largely defined by the Columbia River, but this river also provides other important uses and benefits that need to be balanced with hydropower generation; this inevitably leads to difficult trade-off decisions involving multiple stakeholders.
- Fish and wildlife (including salmon and steelhead) mortality are our power system’s most significant environmental cost; wild salmon are sacred to Columbia Basin Tribes and are important to commercial and sports fishers and the environmental community; other stakeholders focus on the river’s important role as the economic engine of the region.
- The Columbia River is an international river and the revisions to the Columbia River Treaty between the US and Canada that are currently being negotiated will have major implications for hydropower generation, flood control, and salmon recovery throughout the entire Columbia River Basin.
- The Federal government has an unusually significant presence in our region; it includes the BPA that markets and transits much of our region’s electricity and two additional federal agencies (US Army Corps of Engineers and Bureau of Reclamation) that own and operate 31 federal dams.
- The Northwest has ensured a significant role for consumer-owned (or public power) utilities as well as investor-owned utilities.
- No other region in the country has an inter-state compact like the Northwest Power and Conservation Council with its unique set of roles and responsibilities.
- The region has a long history of coordination and cooperation, but it also has a history of regional infighting and deal making; many of our region’s most important historical “deals” remain relevant today, and those who ignore or are unaware of them are likely to trip up and fail.
- The Northwest has taken the concept of energy efficiency as a power resource very seriously since 1980; the region is now embracing renewable energy, demand response, energy storage, community solar, grid modernization and the greening of the electric grid, energy and climate justice, and other components of a clean and just energy economy with a similar level of enthusiasm and commitment.
Course Content
This course explores the history, politics, and institutions related to current energy policy and administration, with particular attention to the distinctive nature of energy policy issues in the Pacific Northwest and the Columbia River Basin. It provides social science theories and analytical tools to help graduate students and energy professional navigate the complexities of the energy sector. It does so by:
- Preparing students to perform analyses of energy sector projects and understand the regulatory environment in which the energy sector operates.
- Helping the students apply these analytic skills to a set of key energy policy issues that are particularly relevant to the Pacific Northwest and the Western US. For example, we will examine the significance of hydropower in our region, what is distinctive about the institutional context of Northwest energy policy, energy efficiency, strategies to support grid resiliency and renewables integration, infrastructure siting, analyzing and engaging with energy stakeholders, energy sector modeling and policy analysis, integrated resource planning, addressing carbon impacts, and tips from the BPA Administrator on how he makes decisions and balances competing demands in an environment characterized by significant uncertainty.
The course begins by exploring some fundamental questions about energy policy in the Pacific Northwest:
- Why is energy policy an important topic for academic study and professional knowledge?
- What are some of the most important energy policy decisions in our region over the past century that remain relevant today?
- What is distinctive about the institutional context for Northwest energy policy?
- What are some of the most important features we should know about the electricity and natural gas sectors?
Armed with this background information, we will be prepared to explore some of the most important current energy policy issues impacting our region. We will do so with the help of some of the region’s most knowledgeable and prominent energy policy experts. Student suggestions will help guide the selection of policy topics. However, here are some of the topics the instructor and students selected for the Fall 2022 edition of this course. They are good examples of the sorts of “real world” policy issues we will consider in 2023.
- The movement to incorporate energy and climate justice perspectives into the energy policy-making process by advocating for equity in the social and economic participation in the energy system, while also remediating social, economic, and health burdens on marginalized “frontline communities” that have been historically harmed by the energy system.
- Emerging strategies to support resilience, reliability, and flexibility in the generation, transmission, distribution, and consumption of energy.
- The latest developments in integrated resource planning and distribution planning;
- The role of energy sector economics, modeling and policy analysis;
- Carbon and renewables regulation;
- Community-scale renewable energy systems;
- The latest developments involving energy efficiency, demand response, and other demand side management options;
- Grid modernization and the greening of the grid;
- Balancing salmon recovery, hydropower generation, and the other multiple uses of the Columbia and Snake Rivers: Lower Snake River Management and the pros and cons of dam breaching;
- Where the Rubber meets the Road: How the BPA Administrator (John Hairston) balances the energy policy and management opportunities and challenges faced by BPA and the region’s broader energy community;
- Student presentations on relevant and cutting edge energy policy topics.