TVA Improves Ways of Tracking New Technology, Strengthens Recording Security

• An independent regulator said TVA needed to improve its operations.
• The report comes as TVA races to meet ambitious decarbonisation targets.
• TVA does not consistently track the technology it employs, the report said.
• TVA also does not properly track how it preserves and protects R&D information.

As the Tennessee Valley Authority works to meet its ambitious decarbonization goals, the authority’s independent regulator is asking the nation’s largest public utility to bring more discipline to its operations.

In its main conclusion, the TVA Inspector General’s Office found that TVA needed to improve how it selects and tracks new technologies, such as small modular nuclear reactors, to generate electricity for 10 million people in Tennessee and parts of six other states. as an industrial and federal facility.

In addition, the inspector general warned that TVA was not effectively tracking the R&D records it was creating and that records were stored on home and shared drives that could be vulnerable to attack by outsiders.

The inspector general’s report, released Thursday, focused on the findings and recommendations, including the TVA’s response to the report.

What does the watchdog report suggest?

“Over the past decade, TVA has generally adopted commercially available proven resource technologies,” the Inspector General’s report said. “However, if TVA seeks to integrate new resource technologies, such as small modular reactors, a consistent approach to assessing new technologies may reduce negative consequences such as costs, increases, schedule delays or lower-than-expected delivery capabilities.”

The Inspector General recommends that TVA follow a framework promoted by the Government Accountability Office to adopt new technologies and assess their risks and readiness. TVA said it already had multiple assessment methods in place, but agreed to standardize the process to follow Government Accountability Office recommendations.