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U.S. GOVERNMENT
INFORMATION
Op
Calendar No. 262
116TH CONGRESS SEAEREPORT
1st Session J SENATE 116-142
WESTERN AREA POWER ADMINISTRATION
TRANSPARENCY ACT
OCTOBER 23, 2019.-Ordered to be printed
Ms. MURKOWSKI, from the Committee on Energy and Natural
Resources, submitted the following
REPORT
[To accompany S. 1931]
The Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, to which was
referred the bill (S. 1931) to require the Administrator of the West-
ern Area Power Administration to establish a pilot project to pro-
vide increased transparency for customers, and for other purposes,
having considered the same, reports favorably thereon without
amendment and recommends that the bill do pass.
PURPOSE
The purpose of S. 1931 is to require the Administrator of the
Western Area Power Administration (WAPA) to establish a pilot
project to provide increased transparency for customers.
BACKGROUND AND NEED
WAPA is one of four Power Marketing Administrations charged
with the marketing and transmission of hydropower from Federal
facilities. WAPA markets power from 56 hydropower plants to
nearly 700 wholesale customers, serving over 40 million people in
15 states across the western United States.
WAPA's roughly $1 billion annual budget is funded through a
combination of direct appropriations and revenues collected from
its customers. Over time, differences between budgeted and exe-
cuted amounts have built up large unobligated balances. Certain
levels of unobligated balances are a necessary financing tool that
agencies like WAPA use to avoid sudden spikes in needed appro-
priations or electric rates for both planned and unanticipated cap-
ital projects. However, in an October 2015 report entitled 2013 Se-
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