House passage of energy standard won't affect TVA

Aug 5 - McClatchy-Tribune Regional News - Dave Flessner Chattanooga Times/Free Press, Tenn.

The Tennessee Valley Authority and its distributors are exempt from a key requirement of the energy legislation adopted Saturday by the U.S. House of Representatives.

But the Chattanooga-based trade group that lobbies for TVA's distributors and the co-chairman of the TVA Congressional Caucus still opposed the measure.

The House voted 220-190 for an amendment to require by 2020 that at least 15 percent of the electricity sold by most utilities must come from renewable sources, including wind, solar and biofuels. U.S. Reps. Tom Udall, D-N.M., and Todd Platts, R-Pa., co-sponsors of the amendment, said the measure would help America's energy independence and cut emissions of greenhouse gases linked to global warming.

But to gain majority support, the amendment excluded public power agencies, including TVA, municipal utilities such as EPB in Chattanooga or electric co-ops such as the North Georgia Electric Membership Corp.

The Tennessee Valley Public Power Association, the Chattanooga trade group which represents TVA distributors, lobbied Congress to oppose the renewable requirement. Phillip Burgess, director of communications for TVPPA, said distributors fear the measure later might be expanded to include TVA distributors.

"We are not opposed to renewable energy, but there isn't as much capacity for wind or solar in the Southeast, and our distributors have to rely upon TVA, which doesn't generate much renewable energy," he said.

In July, the U.S. Senate debated, but did not vote on, an even more aggressive renewable portfolio standard for electricity that would have included EPB and five other major TVA distributors. The differences in the energy bills adopted in each chamber will have to be negotiated this fall in a conference committee.

U.S. Rep. Bud Cramer, D-Ala., co-chairman of the TVA Congressional Caucus, said the South lacks the wind and sunshine of other parts of the country, and the amendment "would result in a transfer of wealth from our region to other areas of the country."

But the head of a TVA environmental watchdog group insisted the amendment adopted by the House could do just the opposite. Stephen Smith, executive director for the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, said TVA could count its hydroelectric modernization program as renewable fuel and sell those credits to other utilities at a profit.

"This could actually help TVA make money while helping to advance the national interests of reducing global warming and energy independence," he said.

E-mail Dave Flessner at dflessner@timesfreepress.com