Docket Number	Docket Name	Company
AR 660	RESOURCE ADEQUACY RULES (FROM UM 2143)

Comment Number	Created Date	Email Received Date	Company Name	Comment Type	Source Type	First Name	Last Name	Email	Nearest City	Comment
AR 660-1	8/26/2024 12:30:15 AM	5/13/2024 5:42:23 PM		General Comment	Email			neelpatelslc@gmail.com		Dear Oregon Public Utility Commissioners Decker, Perkins, and Tawney. My name is Neel Patel, and I’m a physician and climate concerned citizen living in Portland, OR (97209). reaching out about our nation’s electric transmission capacity. Across the country, electricity reliability is threatened by an aging and fragmented grid that cannot support the increased load brought on by economic growth or withstand extreme weather. In 2021, we saw how extreme weather events like Winter Storm Uri can easily jeopardize power grids that aren’t interconnected with the rest of the country. Shoring up our transmission capacity ensures fewer blackouts and a stronger ability to balance our growing electricity load. An inevitable side effect of continued American economic growth is additional strain on the grid, which means we will need all hands on deck in adding new capacity and making the grid operate more efficiently wherever possible. Here in the Northwest we’ve seen power disruptions by wildfire and extreme heat in the summer and extreme cold and ice straining an already strained grid. Improving transmission could benefit the entire state, providing improvements for both cities and rural communities on both sides of the Cascades. In an increasingly polarized environment, having society-based infrastructure benefits everyone regardless how they vote is critically important. As a physician, I have dedicated my life to improving human health. Expanding the US power grid can indirectly improve the health of Oregonians by allowing more solar and wind capacity and weaning off polluting fossil fuels. This is especially for communities around peak power plants which are subject to less pollution control than standard. In Oregon, peaker plants such as the plants in Clatskanie run on natural gas which is cleaner than coal but is still a fossil fuel and associated with nitrous oxide pollution. A stronger energy grid will enable more renewable energy and reduce the need for these plants. Finally transitioning away from fossil fuels in general will help Oregon by halting a warming planet which is fueling many of the climate change effects we are already feeling in the northwest- wildfires, melting glaciers, habitat destruction, etc. Helping to alleviate that grid strain is where public utilities commissions can step in. As regulators, you have several tools at your disposal to help improve this situation. I urge you to consider incentivizing utilities to use grid-enhancing technologies and improve their demand management to make power delivery more efficient, and to implement other regulations that help push utilities to be more energy efficient. I think it’s essential that our utilities are held to the highest possible standards and don’t add to the problem by continuing outdated practices that put unnecessary strain on the grid. As a physician and citizen concerned about climate change, our ability to transition to clean energy is important to me. I was born in the early nineties and have spent the past 30+ years becoming a physician. Half of all CO2 emissions since 1751 have been emitted since 1990. I want to be able to focus on treating my patients and training the next generation of physicians without the worry that emissions will keep rising and we will continue to fail to accomplish our decarbonization goals. Improving the power grid is one of the many steps needed to ensure a livable, healthy future. Please work to implement these reforms, which will go a long way toward improving our grid capacity. Thank you for considering this perspective. Sincerely, Neel Patel, MD