Sponsors (3)
The bill creates a coordinated, transparent planning process to assess and address hydropower and species impacts from the 2024 Record of Decision—improving reliability planning and conservation information—while risking delayed mitigation, potential reductions in hydropower output, and higher costs for taxpayers or ratepayers.
Utilities, local governments, and the Upper Colorado River Basin Fund will receive a coordinated interagency plan (MOU) to address operational, maintenance, and replacement costs tied to the 2024 Record of Decision.
Grid operators and electricity customers—especially in rural communities—will get assessments of hydropower production impacts and replacement-cost estimates to support reliability and resource planning.
Fish and wildlife stakeholders and public-lands managers will receive a formal identification of how the Record of Decision affected ESA-listed species, informing conservation and management actions.
Taxpayers and electricity ratepayers could face higher costs if hydropower losses require expensive replacement generation or infrastructure to maintain grid reliability.
Management changes prompted by identifying ESA impacts could reduce hydropower generation, lowering local revenues and affecting local power supply.
Developing the MOU and completing the planning process could delay immediate mitigation or funding changes, leaving infrastructure risks unresolved in the short term.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Requires the Secretary of the Interior (through the Commissioner of Reclamation) and the Secretary of Energy (through the Western Area Power Administration Administrator), working with the Glen Canyon Dam Adaptive Management Work Group, to promptly enter a memorandum of understanding to assess how the July 2024 supplement to the Glen Canyon Dam long‑term plan affects the Upper Colorado River Basin Fund. The agencies must create a plan, using existing hydropower contract data, to address Fund obligations for operations and infrastructure, impacts to hydropower production and grid reliability (including replacement costs), and effects on species listed under the Endangered Species Act. The bill clarifies it does not change Administrative Procedure Act rights or obligations.
Introduced February 5, 2025 by Harriet Hageman · Last progress May 14, 2025