SIERRA NEVADA REGION BROCHURE

​​The University of California at Davis, the City of Redding, California, and a Department of Energy research lab are a few of the varied customers that Sierra Nevada serves with reliable hydropower. Whether the need is for lighting campus residence halls or providing power to support scientific research, our goal is to serve customers with reliable power.

SN is one of four regions of Western Area Power Administration, a federal power marketing administration. WAPA sells wholesale power and bulk wholesale transmission to local utilities, which then provide the power to more than 40 million Americans. SN employees work around the clock to keep bulk power moving through the interconnected transmission system so that electricity ultimately reaches your home or business.​

DELIVERING POWER

Sierra Nevada carries out WAPA’s mission to preference customers in northern and central California. Most power sold by the region is generated by powerplants owned and operated by the Bureau of Reclamation from the California Central Valley Project, including those at Shasta, Folsom, Trinity and New Melones dams. We import additional power over WAPA’s share of the Pacific Northwest-Pacific Southwest Intertie and the California-Oregon Transmission Project—500-kilovolt lines linking northern and central California to the Pacific Northwest. After meeting project-use loads, CVP power serves the equivalent of the electrical needs of 650,000 Californians annually. We sell about 5.5 billion kilowatt-hours of power in an average water year. Selling and delivering those electrical resources to irrigation districts, joint power agencies, cities and towns, public utility districts, military and federal research installations, educational institutions and prisons in California is SN’s main business. We also serve these customers by operating and maintaining 25 substations and more than 1,300 miles of 69- to 500-kV transmission lines.​

PROVIDING SERVICES

In Sierra Nevada, we provide our customers with diverse services. We provide scheduling coordinator services—matching loads and supplies for customers—and communicate information to the control area. If customers desire new products and services, we are open to exploring their ideas. To serve customers, SN employees manage projects; ensure environmental protection; establish and monitor employee safety and system security programs; manage administrative functions, such as property management and information services; schedule power and handle customer billing; analyze hydroelectric resources; ensure system maintenance; administer contracts; set rates; provide technical assistance regarding efficient energy use; and oversee finances and budgeting. Operating from several duty stations throughout northern California, including the regional office in Folsom, California, we work at the forefront of technological advances and amid unprecedented change in the electric utility industry. With many diverse players competing in the electric utility industry to buy and sell power, we will build upon our products and services to meet customer needs. Our goals are to market reliable Central Valley Project power, provide customer services that keep pace with the new industry and enhance our ability to repay project obligations. To help achieve these goals, we have taken steps to reduce costs by identifying and developing more effective new products and services.​

FACING THE FUTURE

Our future depends on our interactions with other players in the industry. For instance, cooperative ventures with other California entities are common throughout our service territory. Being flexible to changes in the industry, enhancing our existing relationships and improving service will shape our future in Sierra Nevada. We look forward to building upon our existing relationships and creating new ones.​