TVPPA and TVA have occasionally tried one another and will likely continue to do so, but that the two organizations work constructively with one another is imperative.
So said TVPPA President/CEO Doug Peters to the TVA Board of Directors at that body’s Nov. 9 meeting in Counce, TN. It was Peters’ first appearance before TVA’s directors as TVPPA’s chief executive.
Peters said TVPPA believes there are “four strategic issues” on which TVPPA must work with TVA with a goal of “near-term resolution”:
# Optimizing what remains of TVA’s current long-range financial plan and helping craft its successor
# Identifying rates that will benefit the Valley’s power consumers
# Crafting a shared strategy for integrating distributed energy resources into TVA’s power system in a way that maintains fairness, reliability and cost-competitiveness, and
# Identifying and implementing a plan to protect the generations-old investment the Valley’s power consumers have made in TVA’s system.
“Make no mistake,” Peters said. “The scope of work inherent in the resolution of these issues is unprecedented and will require unprecedented levels of communications and cooperation.
“I am confident that, at times, the tone of our dialog will be pointed and will try our mutual patience and good nature. I am also confident that, in the end, the people of the Tennessee Valley will be able to enjoy the benefits of emerging technologies as well as the affordable, reliable power our collective efforts have made possible for the last 80-plus years.”
Peters began his remarks by reading TVPPA Board of Directors Resolutions 17/07 and 17/08, which commend the service of outgoing TVA Directors Dr. Marilyn Brown and former chair Lynn Evans.