Tennessee Valley Authority

I

Introduction

Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), federal corporation, created by the Congress of the United States in 1933 to operate Wilson Dam and to develop the Tennessee River and its tributaries in the interest of navigation, flood control, and the production and distribution of electricity. Related TVA activities, based on the original TVA Act and subsequent enactments, include reforestation, industrial and community development, test-demonstration farming, the development of fertilizer, and the establishment of recreational facilities.

An independent agency of the executive department, the TVA is administered by a board of three officials who are appointed by the U.S. president to staggered terms lasting nine years each; the appointments are subject to approval by the U.S. Senate. The TVA has approximately 19,000 employees. The main offices of the TVA are in Knoxville, Tennessee.

Power generated in TVA plants is distributed over an area of about 207,000 sq km (about 80,000 sq mi). This region has a population of more than 7 million; it comprises Tennessee and parts of Alabama, Virginia, Georgia, Kentucky, North Carolina, and Mississippi.

II

TVA Dams

The 50 dams operated by the TVA serve many purposes. The dams provide electricity, control flooding, increase the region’s water supply, and provide lakes for recreational purposes. In addition, the nine major dams on the main stream of the Tennessee River create a series of narrow lakes that together form a continuous navigation channel from Knoxville, Tennessee, to Paducah, Kentucky; the channel is 1045 km (650 mi) long and 2.7 m (9 ft) deep. Near Paducah, the channel connects with the Ohio River and the 21-state inland-waterway system. Other TVA dams are on tributaries of the Tennessee River. In flood season they store potential floodwaters, lowering flood crests substantially on the Tennessee, Ohio, and Mississippi rivers.

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III

Electric Power

Twenty-nine of the dams operated by the TVA generate electricity. The TVA system also includes 11 large coal-burning steam plants, which generate most of the electricity produced by the TVA. The TVA currently operates nuclear-powered electric-generating plants at two sites in Alabama and Tennessee, and an additional plant is under construction in Tennessee. The TVA power system annually produces more than 125 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity, which is almost 90 times as much electricity as was generated in the same region in 1933. Average annual home electricity use in the area has grown from 600 kilowatt-hours in 1933 to nearly 15,000 kilowatt-hours.

IV

Research and Other Activities

The TVA continues to serve as a testing ground for agricultural, environmental, educational, economic, and industrial programs.

At Muscle Shoals, Alabama, the TVA operates the National Fertilizer Development Center. The advanced fertilizers developed here are used nationally in research and educational programs in cooperation with industries and universities.

In cooperation with state and other agencies, the TVA conducts research and development programs in forestry, fish and wildlife preservation, watershed protection, and air and water quality control. In addition, the TVA encourages the economic development of Tennessee Valley tributary areas through citizen associations. More than 100 valley communities with local flood problems have been helped by the TVA, which offered technical guidance and built improved channels and detention dams where feasible.

In the late 1970s the TVA, Commonwealth Edison of Chicago, and the Department of Energy, together with the nation’s electric industry, entered into a controversial venture to build the first large demonstration liquid-metal fast breeder reactor in the United States, to be operated as a part of the TVA power system (see Nuclear Energy: Breeder Reactors). An estimated $1.7 billion was spent preparing a site for the reactor on the Clinch River near Oak Ridge, Tennessee. In 1983, however, the U.S. Senate refused to provide additional funds for the demonstration project, which had the potential of producing more fissionable fuel than it consumed.

More than 60 million people per year visit the recreational TVA lakes. In the western parts of Kentucky and Tennessee, the TVA operates Land Between the Lakes, a demonstration project that offers outdoor recreation and wildlife education. The site, located between two artificial lakes, is a strip of woodland 64 km (40 mi) long.

All TVA activities, including navigation, flood control, environmental research, land management, and economic development programs, are financed solely through the sale of electricity. Power-system facilities, originally supported by appropriations, are financed from revenues and through the sale of power revenue bonds and notes. Beginning in 1989, after a 15-year absence from the public agency debt market, the TVA launched a major refinancing effort that has saved the agency more than $200 million in interest expense reductions. By the early 1990s the U.S. Treasury also had received about $2.8 billion from TVA power proceeds as repayments and dividends on the appropriation investment.