The Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs are pushing forward with one of the most ambitious infrastructure projects in the reservation's history — a new high-voltage transmission line that would dramatically expand the region's electrical capacity and position the tribe as a major player in the Pacific Northwest's clean energy future.
The Warm Springs Power Pathway
The Warm Springs Power and Water Enterprise (WSPWE) is developing what it calls the Warm Springs Power Pathway: a new 500-kilovolt transmission line that would follow an existing 100-mile right-of-way corridor from the Round Butte Substation — near the tribe's hydroelectric facilities on the Deschutes River — to the Bethel Substation near Salem.
The existing 230-kilovolt line, built in the 1960s, operates at or near full capacity. The new line would increase transmission capacity from roughly 200 megawatts to more than 2,000 megawatts — a tenfold increase. Importantly, the older line would remain in service to handle local energy interconnections within the region.
'Transmission Is Your Number One Priority'
Cathy Ehli, general manager of WSPWE, said the transmission bottleneck has long been the central obstacle to energy development on the reservation.
"Transmission is your number one priority," Ehli said. "The tribe has significant energy development opportunities but has lacked the transmission capacity needed to bring new projects to market."
Ehli also pointed to grid resilience as a core motivation — noting past major power failures, including the Texas power crisis, as stark reminders of the risks posed by aging infrastructure. By following an existing right-of-way across the Cascades, the project avoids many of the permitting and environmental hurdles that typically come with establishing new transmission corridors through mountain terrain.
Federal Support and Next Steps
The project is moving through a multi-year permitting process. WSPWE is working with the U.S. Department of Energy on expedited environmental reviews that could shorten the timeline by up to two years. Over the next six to twelve months, preliminary geotechnical studies will be conducted under the oversight of the tribe's Branch of Natural Resources.
WSPWE and Portland General Electric are also planning community workshops and advisory committees for both tribal members and neighboring residents — including those in Jefferson County. Those sessions are expected to begin in the coming months.
A Renewable Energy Platform
Beyond reliability improvements, the additional transmission capacity is seen as a gateway for future renewable energy projects — including solar and wind development on tribal lands. Tribal leaders have long viewed energy sovereignty as a key economic pillar, and the Power Pathway is designed to support that vision for generations to come.
For residents in Jefferson County and across Central Oregon, the project could improve regional grid reliability and reduce the vulnerability to outages that has historically affected communities east of the Cascades.