WAPA Celebrates 45 Years Powering the West

By Tracey LeBeau​

It has been an incredible journey for the organization and the people closely intertwined with its legacy and success, both employees and customers alike. WAPA as well as the Department of Energy was established amid the 1970s energy crisis, and today we find ourselves in a modern age of electrification that is unlike anything we have seen since electricity was first introduced in American homes in the late 1800s.

 

Through the eyes of employees and the customers, WAPA has through the decades delivered on its mission of marketing federal hydropower and operating critical transmission systems throughout the West. All the while, WAPA has capably managed through periods of drought and hydrological surplus, endured increasingly extreme storms and wildfires, answered countless calls for mutual aid, joined organized markets, defended against rising cybersecurity threats, and constructed and rebuilt segments of the transmission system now integral to energy delivery across our footprint. We have and continue to play a meaningful and significant role in our evolving industry and in our nation’s fast-moving energy landscape. 

 

Yet for all the change we have witnessed, what is truly remarkable is what remains essentially the same. Our mission. 

 

The complexities we face as an industry continue to grow but our mission serves as a steadfast beacon. It is a beacon for focus in a storm. And it is a beacon to professionals who could work for any organization but are drawn to work with purpose. 

 

From our power marketing professionals who sell the hydropower, to our natural resources leaders who protect the environmental and cultural resources in our territory, to the dispatchers directing energy in our balancing authorities, to the craft maintaining our extensive transmission system and to all those other critical functions that empower our mission success. Every single one of us brings a vital piece to this complex machine, and it is through our collective efforts and those of past employees that we rise to every challenge, face every uncertainty and serve our customers with exemplary service, innovativeness and resolve.

 

I find it especially poignant that we have a new strategic plan to herald our 45th year. For what are anniversaries but times for recommitment, affirmation of partnerships and a commemoration of all we have accomplished in the past. I look forward to leaning into our shared ideals and goals in WAPA’s Power Forward 2030 strategic plan to further inspire us.  

 

Thank you for all you do, and all you will continue to do, in support of WAPA and the important purpose it serves to our customers and our nation. 

 

Happy 45th anniversary, WAPA. 

 

 

Administrator and CEO

Tracey LeBeau.