The Hanukkah Eve windstorm of 2006 was the latest of many windstorms causing widespread damage to the Puget Sound region Tidal power has also been proposed as a future source, and a pilot tidal turbine project undertaken by Snohomish County PUD, said to be the first of its kind in the world, was abandoned in 2014. Proposed future infrastructure includes the Juan de Fuca Cable Project, an underwater high voltage DC intertie crossing Strait of Juan de Fuca to Vancouver Island in Canada, which would supply Puget Sound consumers with abundant Canada wind power. As of 2017, Columbia Generating Station at the Hanford Site is the only nuclear power reactor in Washington and there are no nuclear power plants in Western Washington. The Satsop Nuclear Power Plant west of Olympia was conceived in the early 1970s partly in response to inadequate power resources in the region, and canceled after more than five years of construction during the early 1980s recession due to decreased demand and stagflation, resulting in the largest municipal bond default in history at the time. Another plan to build a Skagit Nuclear Power Plant also never materialized.
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Instead, Seattle began an intensive energy conservation campaign called Kill-A-Watt. In 1969 the Seattle City Council approved purchase of Kiket Island to build two city-owned nuclear power plants, but the plan was dropped before construction began. The last major transmission line west of the Cascades was built in the 1970s and a proposal to build a new 80-mile (130 km) 500 kV line between Castle Rock and Troutdale (near Portland) was killed in 2017. Jackson Hydroelectric Project on the Sultan River, Electron Hydroelectric Project on the Puyallup River, and Koma Kulshan Project on Mount Baker.īonneville Power Administration owns a great deal of high-voltage transmission equipment and rights of way in the region. Smaller hydroelectric facilities include Alder Dam on the Nisqually River, Nooksack Falls Hydroelectric Power Plant, Henry M. Snoqualmie Falls Hydroelectric Plant, which came online in 1899, is and the first underground power station in the world, and one of the first to use alternating current and aluminum long-distance transmission wires (to Seattle).
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Packwood Lake Hydroelectric Project is owned by Energy Northwest (formerly Washington Public Power Supply System) which also operates a nuclear reactor in Eastern Washington. There is one coal power plant in the Puget Sound area, Centralia Power Plant, scheduled for shutdown by 2025. 2 at Lake Cushman in the foothills of the Olympic Mountains. Seattle City Light owns considerable infrastructure including the Skagit River Hydroelectric Project and high voltage transmission system. Of the three only PSE operates in the Puget Sound area. Three investor-owned electric utilities in Washington ( Avista (formerly Washington Water Power), PacifiCorp (formerly Pacific Power and Light Company), and Puget Sound Energy (PSE)) are regulated by the Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission (WUTC) which sets rates.
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Historically this has been due to the large supply from public utility-owned sources. Costs are among the lowest in the nation at an average 7.6 cents per kilowatt-hour in 2016. The vast majority of the region's electricity is hydroelectricity from the Columbia River, with a contribution from Washington wind power and nuclear as well as local combined cycle natural gas, and some electricity is available via interties from Southern California in the winter (see Western Interconnection). The Puget Sound region consumes more electricity than it produces. Cross-Cascades high voltage AC paths linking the Puget Sound region to Columbia River hydroelectric generation