Energy and Commerce Committee leaders seek information from TVA on business practices
Members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee are seeking information from Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) on its lack of deployment of renewable energy and other business practices.
Specifically, the lawmakers are concerned that TVA is interfering with the deployment of renewable and distributed energy resources, which would appear inconsistent with TVA’s statutory requirement to provide low-cost power to residents of the Tennessee Valley.
“The Committee is concerned that TVA’s business practices are inconsistent with these statutory requirements to the disadvantage of TVA’s ratepayers and the environment. Specifically, we are concerned that Tennessee Valley residents pay too much for electricity, which particularly impacts low-income households in Tennessee. The Committee is also concerned that TVA is interfering with the adoption of renewable energy by its commercial and residential customers and, while it is making progress on decarbonization, it must do more this decade,” the four Committee leaders wrote to TVA CEO Jeffrey Lyash.
The letter was authored by Reps. Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ), E&C Committee chair; Bobby Rush (D-IL), chair of the Energy Subcommittee; Diana DeGette (D-CO), chairman of the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee; and Paul Tonko (D-NY), chair of and Environment and Climate Change Subcommittee.
The TVA was created by federal statute through the Tennessee Valley Authority Act. It is required to “give preference to States, counties, municipalities, and cooperative organizations of citizens or farmers, not organized or doing business for profit” and maintain national leadership in technology innovation, low-cost power, and environmental stewardship.
Congress has safeguarded TVA ratepayers from predatory practices by requiring the federal electric utility to engage in “least cost planning” that accounts for the “full range of existing and incremental resources,” including energy conservation and efficiency and renewable energy resources.
The lawmakers cited an analysis that found hundreds of thousands of low-income households in Tennessee face an elevated energy burden, with some spending as much as 27 percent of their annual income on energy. The lawmakers are concerned that the high electric bills result, in part, from TVA’s decision to reduce its funding for its energy efficiency programs by nearly two-thirds between 2014 and 2018, along with its imposition of fixed fees that get passed along to ratepayers in the Tennessee Valley.
Further, they expressed concern over internal documents showing that TVA’s fixed charges may be intended to interfere with the deployment of renewable energy. The lawmakers point to TVA’s unambitious carbon emission reduction goals, which fail to meet the Biden Administration’s objective of achieving a carbon-pollution-free electricity sector by 2035.
The Committee conducted an investigation last Congress to see if TVA was using ratepayer dollars to fund the Utility Air Regulatory Group (UARG), which lawmakers called a front group devoted to rolling back Clean Air Act regulations. UARG was subsequently disbanded in the face of this scrutiny.
In this new inquiry, the committee leaders are seeking TVA’s rationale for annual changes in energy efficiency funding; an explanation as to whether certain TVA rate changes were intended to interfere with the deployment of distributed energy resources; if TVA intends to update its decarbonization goals; an explanation for TVA’s comparative underinvestment in solar and wind generation; and
TVA’s plans for replacing its Kingston and Cumberland Fossil Plants.
