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Pacific Northwest Energy Co history
Pacific Northwest Energy Co company history timeline
By 1868, Portland Gas Light Co. was responsible for keeping the water hot in the boilers of Portland’s horse-drawn, steam fire engines—the first recorded use of local gas for a purpose other than lighting.
For the 2,000 residents residing in the young and growing town, New Year's Eve of 1873 was the first time that gas lamps lit 42 private homes and five public streets.
In 1889, a new form of energy attracted the attention of Seattle Gas' founders, as Seattle became the fourth city in the world to operate an electric streetcar system.
In 1892, Charles F. Adams, A.L. Mills, and other businessmen bought the Portland Gas Light Co., tied both plants together with a pipeline that went under the Willamette River, and changed the company’s name to Portland Gas Co.
Service halted briefly when the record 1894 flood ripped out the underwater crossing, but the company soon rebuilt its manufacturing facilities above the high water mark.
California oil became cheaper than coal; so, in 1906, the company began a plant changeover.
By 1910, there were 332 miles of mains serving about ten city districts, and the company incorporated as Portland Gas & Coke Co.
PacifiCorp began in 1910 as Pacific Power & Light Company, which was formed through the merger of several financially troubled electric utilities in the Pacific Northwest.
In 1913, Portland Gas & Coke built its third and last gas manufacturing plant in Linnton, where it made gas from oil, not coal.
Mountain States, founded in 1917, served western Oregon, northern Idaho, western Montana, and Wyoming.
In 1940 the company reorganized because the lingering effects of the Depression left it unable to meet its bond debts.
By 1941, six of the Northwest's privately owned utilities -- Washington Water Power, PP&L, Northwestern Electric, Montana Power, Idaho Power, and Utah Power & Light -- were linked in a partnership called Northwest Interconnected Systems.
By 1941 Pacific was in a solid financial position, with income of $740,000 on sales of $6.7 million.
In 1942, the federal government encouraged the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) to interconnect with 10 public and private electrical systems for maximum wartime production.
Meanwhile, the Northwest Power Pool expanded into Canada in 1948 when British Columbia Electric (later to evolve into BC Hydro) was granted membership in the Northwest Power Pool.
In 1949, American Power & Light sold off its holdings in Portland Gas & Coke.
In 1950 Electric Bond & Share spun off Pacific as an independent, publicly traded company.
The Northwest Power Pool's four major benefits were well established by 1954, according to a report by BPA's Anthony Netboy.
In anticipation of the fuel's arrival, Seattle Gas and Electric Light Company, which by this time had been renamed Seattle Gas Company, merged with Washington Gas & Electric Co., a utility based in Tacoma, Washington, in 1955, to form Washington Natural Gas Company.
The company soon thereafter enjoyed renewed development once natural gas arrived from the southwest in 1956 and 15 months later from British Columbia.
In 1956, the first natural gas began flowing through the local distribution system.
The Northwest Power Pool members formed the nucleus of that entity and they huddled together and crafted the 1961 Pacific Northwest Coordination Agreement, replacing the existing voluntary agreements between the Power Pool members.
Revenues also continued their exponential rise, reaching nearly $26 million by the end of 1962, which represented a 132 percent increase since the utility had converted to natural gas.
By the beginning of 1963, the company had connected its 100,000th customer, adding a minimum of 10,000 customers annually in the first three years of the decade.
By 1968, Washington Natural Gas served 164,183 customers, and its earnings had reached $4.5 million, a twelvefold increase in ten years.
Encouraged by this success, Washington Natural Gas management allocated over $75 million to be spent by 1972 for capital expenditures in anticipation of increasing the number of its customers by 90,000.
However, water seepage into key Canadian natural gas fields in 1973, as well as increased Canadian demand, demonstrated to Washington Natural Gas the inherent danger of depending on one source for a majority of its gas.
The new Canadian dams on the Columbia River were finished by 1973.
In 1973 the company bought a majority interest in Telephone Utilities, a company in rural Washington that had assembled a network by buying small local telephone companies that had been ignored by the Bell System.
In 1975, an NWEC founding member, the Natural Resources Defense Council, released its “Alternative Scenario” for the Northwest energy future.
In 1976 it formed Northern Energy Resources Company (NERCO) to manage its coal properties and mining operations.
By 1977, Washington Natural Gas investments in ventures unrelated to natural gas distribution led the utility to form a holding company to reorganize its operations and separate its other interests into distinct subsidiaries.
In 1978, a holding company, Washington Energy Company, was formed to enable the diversification into energy related businesses.
In 1979, the Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission withdrew its permission for Washington Energy Co. to fund oil and natural gas exploration by charging expenses to customers.
In 1979 Pacific bought Alascom from RCA Corporation for $210 million.
In 1980, Congress passed the Pacific Northwest Power Planning and Conservation Act, known as the Northwest Power Act, which was partially aimed at protecting the fish runs.
That record begins even before the formal incorporation of the Coalition in 1981.
Its fiscal 1981 revenues were $358 million with net income of $17 million.
As Canadian natural gas became increasingly expensive, the company began to rely more on the alternative sources created by its subsidiaries, and by 1982, only half of the utility's supply came from Canada.
In 1982 Pacific changed the name of Telephone Utilities to Pacific Telecom and its own name to PacifiCorp, of which Pacific Power became a subsidiary.
In 1982 NERCO acquired Clements Energy Incorporated, an oil and gas exploration company.
By 1982, 46 percent of PacifiCorp's revenue came from nonutility operations, which offered a rate of return two to three times greater than the company's electric unit.
NERCO launched a drive in 1983 to sign industrial customers to long-term coal contracts to make up for declining sales to utilities. Its earnings also were helped by the 1982 purchase of two gold and silver mines in Nevada.
The Northwest Power Planning (now Northwest Power and Conservation) Council’s 1983 regional power plan mirrored the Coalition’s own Model Plan, adopted a year earlier.
By 1983 Pacific Telecom had revenues of $341 million.
NERCO launched a drive in 1983 to sign industrial customers to long-term coal contracts to make up for declining sales to utilities.
In 1984, an NCAC study, “Perfecting the Plan,” found that the Council’s estimates of efficiency potential in commercial lighting were significantly understated.
In 1984 PacifiCorp formed Inner PacifiCorp, Inc., to hold NERCO, Pacific Telecom, and other nonelectric businesses.
By 1985, Washington Natural Gas had become the 47th largest natural gas distributor in the United States, with 266,349 customers.
Although revenues sagged after the record year of 1985, by the end of the decade the utility had once again returned to posting enviable financial figures.
In 1985, NCAC and NRDC jointly proposed the development of a facility to demonstrate and promote energy-efficient lighting for commercial buildings.
Net income for 1987 was $266 million.
In 1988, the Coalition supported the successful campaign, of Friends of the Earth, to get the Northwest Power Planning Council to set aside about 44,000 miles of Northwest streams as critical habitat for fish and wildlife.
With the cooperation of Seattle City Light, the Bonneville Power Administration, and others, the Seattle Lighting Design Lab opened its doors in December 1989.
Northwest Natural also instituted sweeping interdepartmental reorganization in late 1989, a labor-management partnership called the Joint Accord, that legislated employment security—no layoffs for employees hired prior to the accord—in return for performance-based pay increases.
Utah and Oregon provided most of the company's electric revenue, with 37.2 percent and 29.6 percent, respectively, in 1989.
Net income for 1989 was $466 million on sales of $3.6 billion.
In 1990, Washington Natural Gas recorded $292 million in revenues and $20.6 million in net income.
Starting in 1990, with the formation of a new company subsidiary, Canor Energy Ltd., Northwest Natural began purchasing gas and oil properties in Canada, adding to its properties in Oregon, Wyoming, and California.
In 1991, NCAC helped launch the Save Our Wild Salmon (SOS) coalition to restore Columbia Basin wild salmon and steelhead species now on the federal Endangered Species List – due to primarily the existence and operation of federal hydropower dams.
In 1991 NERCO bought Union Texas Petroleum's oil and gas operations in the Gulf of Mexico, dramatically increasing its petroleum reserves.
Anticipating similar results in 1992, Washington Natural's management was disappointed by a year of unusually warm weather, which impeded revenue growth.
The federal government began deregulating the nation's entire power industry beginning in 1992 with National Energy Policy Act, with the stated goal of transitioning the industry to more competitive electricity markets.
The 1992 National Energy Act, which allowed independent energy developers to generate, buy, and sell electricity, transformed PacifiCorp's plans for the future.
The first to go was PacifiCorp's gold and silver mining operation, which was sold in 1992.
StaffSara Patton Executive Director Phone: (206) 621-0094 sara@nwenergy.org Sara Patton has led the NW Energy Coalition as its Executive Director since November 1993.
As a first step in entering a competitive market, PacifiCorp established a marketing office for wholesale power in Las Vegas in 1994.
In 1995 the members adopted the Membership Agreement, which formalized many of the voluntary arrangements of the various committee activities.
In 1995 PacifiCorp sold its long-distance telephone provider Alascom to AT&T. Not only did these sales bring in cash that could be used in strategic acquisitions, it also helped the company focus on its electric utilities and its wholesale marketing of electricity.
In 1997, the organization’s name was changed to the NW Energy Coalition (NWEC), reflecting a mission that had transcended the now historic Northwest Power and Conservation Act.
Convincing BPA to invest in low-income weatherization via community action agencies in 1997.
In 1997, Northwest Natural joined with Pacificorp to jointly market gas, electricity, and energy services in Oregon and Washington and shortened its name to Northwest Natural.
In 1997, it recruited 430,000 new customers, making it the fastest-growing energy utility in the region.
In 1997 PacifiCorp bought TPC, a natural gas exploration and marketing company, for $435 million.
Helping to establish the Bonneville Environmental Foundation (BEF) in 1998.
In 1998 PacifiCorp moved to acquire The Energy Group, a diversified energy company with operations in the United Kingdom, Australia, and the United States.
April 22, 1999, was one of the most significant dates in the entire history of the Northwest Power Pool.
In 1999, it enjoyed its tenth consecutive year of customer growth greater than 4 percent, while the average growth for natural gas distributors had dropped to 1.5 percent.
By the year 2000, with more than 500,000 customers, Northwest Natural was earning $50.22 million on revenues of $532 million.
Helping launch the non-profit Northwest Sustainable Energy for Economic Development – NW SEED in 2001 (now called Spark Northwest).
In 2001, it agreed to purchase Portland General Electric from ill-fated Enron, a move that would make it the largest natural gas and electric utility in Oregon.
The Coalition’s intervention in Idaho Power’s rate case in 2002, resulted in an Idaho Public Utilities Commission order requiring Idaho Power to establish an energy efficiency advisory group for the first time in the company’s history.
When the final Fifth Plan came out in 2004, it adopted Tellus’ assessment of the role energy efficiency could play and its call for meeting almost all increased needs with efficiency and renewable energy.
So, in 2006, the Coalition spearheaded an effort to pass ballot Initiative-937, which included a renewable portfolio standard and energy efficiency standards for Washington’s largest electric utilities.
Informed public involvement in building a clean and affordable energy future. %CODE1% Award Winners Bob Olsen Memorial Conservation Eagle Award Winners %CODE1% Headwaters Award Recipients %CODE1% Coalition Bylaws 2008 Strategic Plan (.pdf file)
The Coalition released “Bright Future: How to keep the Northwest’s lights on, jobs growing, goods moving and salmon swimming in the era of climate change” in 2009.
In 2011, the Coalition helped negotiate the retirement of TransAlta Corporation’s Centralia, Washington coal-fired power plant.
In 2014, it expanded its training to an online service.
The Coalition’s 2016 research paper, “Building ‘good load’ to reduce carbon emissions: Getting Northwest utilities more involved in widespread transportation electrification.” Made the case for public and ratepayer benefits from transportation electrification.
In 2017, a settlement was reached in Puget Sound Energy (PSE) rate case addressing under recovered costs from operation at the Colstrip Power Plant in Montana, and setting aside funds for decommissioning and clean-up of the plant’s coal-fired generating units.
In 2018, the Coalition released the Lower Snake River Dams Power Replacement Study.
2019 was a landmark year for energy and climate legislation in Washington, and the NW Energy Coalition was instrumental in the passage of a number of bills in the state legislature.
"Northwest Natural Gas Company ." International Directory of Company Histories. . Retrieved June 22, 2022 from Encyclopedia.com: https://www.encyclopedia.com/books/politics-and-business-magazines/northwest-natural-gas-company
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