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<br />. <br /> <br />,/ <br /> <br />June 13, 1995 <br /> <br />See Attached List: <br /> <br />The Western Area Power Administration (Western) is one of the U.S. <br />Department of Energy's power marketing administrations whose sale has <br />been proposed to Congress. Before Congress acted on that proposal, <br />Western's Administrator ordered an agency-wide reorganization. <br /> <br />I've worked for Western for almost 16 years. I know the agency very <br />well. I think that g reorganization is a good idea, but many of the <br />details of this particular plan weren't thought through before it was <br />adopted. If the plan goes forward as it is, I believe it will harm <br />our customers, our employees, and, ultimately, the U.S. Government. <br /> <br />There are several problems with the current reorganization proposal: <br /> <br />I. One of the key factors in Western's 'transformation' is the <br />break-up of electric operations for the Colorado River Storage <br />Project (CRSP). The CRSP's electric power sales and transmission <br />are presently controlled by Western's Salt Lake City Area (SLCA). <br />Operations, scheduling, and billing of power deliveries are <br />managed by Salt Lake's Montrose (Colorado) District Office (MDO) <br />The new configuration will have the CRSP's Flaming Gorge and <br />Aspinall storage unit powerplants, together with the northeast <br />portion of its high-voltage transmission system, controlled by <br />Western's Loveland Area Office (LAO); the Glen Canyon storage <br />unit's powerplant and the southwest part of the CRSP transmission <br />system will be controlled by the Phoenix Area Office (PAO). No <br />plans have been announced for the management of the CRSP's <br />participating projects. <br /> <br />Insufficient attention has been paid to the complexity of the <br />CRSP in the reorganization. Some concerns: <br /> <br />A. It's legislated as one project. Splitting any part of its <br />management between two offices may be illegal. <br /> <br />B. After the reorganization, CRSP electrical affairs will be <br />handled on the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains, and in <br />the Lower Colorado River Basin (Lower Basin). The CRSP was <br />created to facilitate the beneficial use of Colorado River <br />water in the Upper Colorado River Basin (Upper Basin). This <br />will make the CRSP Western's only major project lacking on- <br />site, within-its-own-river-basin, management. The loss of <br />local control is a significant issue. <br /> <br />62110 <br />