Pacific Power receives $50 million grant from U.S. Department of Energy

PORTLAND, Ore. — Pacific Power received a $50 million federal grant to support reliability upgrades to existing infrastructure, reduce large outages and increase transmission capacity to encourage economic development in Oregon and Washington.

The company received the grant through a U.S. Department of Energy “Speed to Power” initiative aimed at improving grid reliability and reducing electricity costs.

“These projects represent a significant opportunity to modernize our transmission system in a cost-effective way,” said Rohit Nair, managing director of Transmission and Distribution Grid Innovation and Strategy. “By increasing the capability of existing infrastructure, we can deliver greater reliability, accommodate future growth and continue providing safe and affordable energy to our customers and communities.”

Each of these upgrades will improve real-time power flow management, enable additional transmission capacity and new large power-load interconnections, and reduce the risk of large outages.

Specifically, the funding will support the deployment of three transmission technologies, including Advanced Power Flow Control at our Merwin Substation on the Lewis River and remotely controlled equipment in Walla Walla, Washington. Grid enhancing technology will also be installed in Lakeview, Oregon, which will be used to improve power flow.