Sept. 04, 2009

Portland, Ore.— Portland General Electric Company (PGE) (NYSE: POR) today issued a draft plan outlining resource strategies to meet its customers’ electricity needs over the next 20 years. The draft is open for public review and comment until October 5.

“Our goal is to continue providing a reliable, responsible power supply at a reasonable cost,” said Jim Piro, president and CEO of PGE. “We’ve worked hard to develop a proposed action plan that will lay the groundwork for Oregon’s energy future, reflecting our customers’ priorities while making good use of existing resources.”

PGE anticipates that its customers’ demand for electricity will increase by an average of 2.3 percent per year or 20 percent by 2020. The draft plan targets:

• All energy efficiency measures identified as achievable by the Energy Trust of Oregon – which PGE expects would meet nearly half of PGE’s load growth from now thru 2020.
• New renewable resources to meet Oregon’s renewable energy standard requirements on or ahead of schedule.
• Demand-side resources – measures that can reliably deliver short-term reductions in customer demand to help manage loads during peak periods.
• New, efficient natural gas-fired generation with state-of-the-art turbines and pollution controls to serve existing load, meet additional load growth and maintain reliability standards. This would include 300 to 500 megawatts of baseload capacity and 100 to 200 megawatts of flexible peak load resources.
• Short- and mid-term market purchases.
• Installation of major emissions control retrofits on PGE’s coal-fired generating plant near Boardman, Oregon, to comply with rules adopted by the state Environmental Quality Commission last spring. The controls would enable continued operation of the plant with an estimated 80 percent reduction in haze-causing emissions and 90 percent reduction in mercury emissions – aggressive reductions that reflect some of the most stringent standards in the country.
• New transmission capacity to help meet growing energy needs, enable development of more renewable power projects, and enhance reliability of the electrical grid. 

“This plan has been developed carefully over 18 months of research and discussion with customer groups, regulators, and outside experts,” said Jim Lobdell, vice president for power operations and resource planning at PGE. “We examined many different portfolio options and took into account the costs, risks and benefits of the resource alternatives available to serve our customers.”

The integrated resource planning process, overseen by the Oregon Public Utility Commission, is designed to identify a future portfolio of resources that offers the best combination of cost and risk, taking into account factors such as environmental impacts, fuel supply availability and price volatility, resource diversity, and the ability of different kinds of resources to reliably meet demand.

Utilities issue resource plans roughly every two years to reflect new technologies, market conditions, and regulatory requirements.

PGE’s overall plan includes a four-year strategy for acquisition of new resources and a 20-year strategy that outlines long term expectations for the utility’s resource needs and portfolio performance. The utility will now accept comments and suggestions from regulators and the public before filing a final plan with the OPUC later this fall. Once filed, the commission will review the plan before issuing an order regarding its “acknowledgement” of the plan.

“This is a solid plan to provide reliable service to our customers, make significant progress on environmental goals, and keep costs reasonable,” Piro said.  “We look forward to a healthy discussion of its merits with our stakeholders and state regulators.”

More information is available on www.PortlandGeneral.com. Public comments on the plan can be sent by e-mail to PGE.IRP@pgn.com.