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As part
of our background work for this publication, we surveyed TVA stakeholders
about the standards by which they might judge this report. Our stakeholders
asked us to be an honest broker—to describe the good things we
did last year, but also to state where our performance needs improvement.
And they asked us to make it clear how they can continue to stay informed
about TVA’s environmental performance and help set the agency’s
direction for the future.
In 1999, as in all years, resource conservation and watershed protection
were the cornerstones of TVA’s sustainable development efforts.
In April the TVA Board adopted a first-of-its-kind residential Shoreline
Management Policy that will accelerate the protection of shorelines
and riparian areas. Our River Operations Group made additional investments
in hydropower technologies that squeeze more power from less water without
harming aquatic habitats. In the coming years, the challenges we face
will include working to protect water resources and quality of life
from the pressures of population growth both within and outside the
Tennessee Valley.
TVA continues to set goals for the improvement of air quality in the
region. We know that in the future we must find cost-effective ways
of producing the electricity that supports the Valley’s growing
economy and its residents’ way of life. As we move ahead, we must
make technology our ally. Yet both public and private investments in
energy research and development stand at a 20-year low. Our plan is
to use the Public Power Institute as a means of igniting efforts by
which TVA and others interested in enlarging the contributions of public
power providers can use science and technology to protect the environment.
Ever-escalating claims for access to TVA’s generating, transmission,
and water-control assets are threatening the agency’s customary
balance of public benefits. Many of the people, places, and institutions
that would gain by a different distribution of these federal resources
do not reside within traditional boundaries. Our challenge is to ensure
that the benefits continue to serve the sustainable development needs
of this region. The year 2000 marks the first meetings of TVA’s
Regional Resource Stewardship Council, which will play a pivotal role
in helping the agency determine if or how a redistribution of the public
benefits it provides would produce a more efficiently integrated resource-management
system.
There is no substitute for ongoing communications with the people we
serve. We look forward to continuing to serve the public good, guided
by the same ideals of sustainable development on which TVA was founded.
Kathryn J. Jackson, Ph. D.
Executive Vice President and Environmental Executive
River System Operations and Environment
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Kathryn J. Jackson,
Ph.D., Executive Vice President and Environmental Executive |
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