Laserfiche WebLink
<br />. <br /> <br /> <br />CREDA <br /> <br />COLORADO RIVER ENERGY DISTRIBUTORS ASSOCIATION <br /> <br />October 1983 <br /> <br />Executive Summary <br /> <br />"Defending The Public's <br />Right To Public Power: <br />A Response of Consumer-Owned Utilities <br />To Utah Power And Light's Application <br />For Colorado River Storag-e Project Power" <br /> <br />"Defending the Public's Right to Public Power" is the response of the <br />consumer-owned electric utility systems which are members of the Colorado <br />River Energy Distributors Association ("CREDA") to Utah Power and Light <br />Company's ("UP&L") application for an allocation of power from the Colorado <br />River Storage project ("CRSP"). The engineering and legal analyses which com- <br />prise CREDA's response are summarized in this Executive Summary. <br /> <br />UP&L's Attack On The Preference Clause <br /> <br />Power generated at federal hydroelectric projects, such as the <br />CRSP, must be marketed in accordance with the Congressional policy embodied in <br />the "preference" clause. This clause, which is incorporated into more than 30 <br />federal statutes, seeks to distribute the benefits of power derived from the <br />nation's water resources directly to the public without benefiting private inter- <br />ests. <br /> <br />In a Position Paper accompanying its application, UP&L proposed <br />that it be permitted to subvert the preference laws by a scheme under which <br />cities which do not now legally qualify as preference customers would buy power <br />from the Western Area Power Administration ("Western") and then resell the <br />power to UP&L for distribution to their citizens. In effect, these "Agent Cities" <br />would be acting as surrogates for the Company, which would derive substantial <br />benefits from the availability of this valuable public resource. <br /> <br />In its Position Paper, UP&L threatened that if Western did not ac- <br />cede to its demands for an allocation of CRSP power, it would take Western to <br />court, claiming that its constitutional rights and those of its Agent Cities were <br />violated. UP&L claimed that Western's refusal to sell CRSP power to it would <br />constitute a denial of due process and would violate the Equal Protection Clause <br />and the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. <br /> <br />Analysis Of The Impact Of UP&L's Request For Power <br /> <br />At the request of CREDA, R. W. Beck and Associates analyzed the <br />potential power and rate impacts that could result if UP&L's request for CRSP <br />power were granted. The R. W. Beck analysis demonstrates the power losses and <br /> <br />r" <br />