40 Facts About TVA

TVA was created by Congress in 1933 as part of President Franklin D Roosevelt's New Deal.

TVA was envisioned both as a power supplier and a regional economic development agency that would work to help modernize the region's economy and society.

Under the leadership of David E Lilienthal, the TVA became the global model for the United States' later efforts to help modernize agrarian societies in the developing world.

TVA provides electricity to approximately ten million people through a diverse portfolio that includes nuclear, coal-fired, natural gas-fired, hydroelectric, and renewable generation.

TVA sells its power to 154 local power utilities, 5 direct industrial and institutional customers, and 12 area utilities.

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The TVA provides navigation and land management along rivers within its region of operation.

TVA's headquarters are located in downtown Knoxville, with large administrative offices in Chattanooga and Nashville in Tennessee and Muscle Shoals, Alabama.

TVA was originally headquartered in Muscle Shoals, but gradually moved its headquarters to Knoxville.

At one point, TVA's headquarters were housed in the Old Federal Customs House at the corner of Clinch Avenue and Market Street.

TVA developed fertilizers, and taught farmers ways to improve crop yields.

TVA hired a few African Americans, generally restricted for janitorial or other low-level positions.

TVA recognized labor unions; its skilled and semi-skilled blue collar employees were unionized, a breakthrough in an area known for corporations hostile to miners' and textile workers' unions.

Many local landowners were suspicious of government agencies, but TVA successfully introduced new agricultural methods into traditional farming communities by blending in and finding local champions.

TVA was one of the first federal hydropower agencies, and was quickly hailed as a success.

However, the abundance of TVA power was one of the major factors in the decision by the U S Army to locate uranium enrichment facilities in Oak Ridge, Tennessee for the world's first atomic bombs.

Political interference kept TVA from securing additional federal appropriations to do so, so it sought the authority to issue bonds.

Electric rates were among the nation's lowest during this time and stayed low as TVA brought larger, more efficient generating units into service.

TVA claimed to have revitalized the nuclear program and instituted a rate freeze that continued for ten years.

In 2002, TVA began work to restart a previously mothballed nuclear reactor at Browns Ferry Unit 1, which was completed in May 2007.

In 2004, TVA implemented recommendations from the Reservoir Operations Study on how it operates the Tennessee River system .

In 2005, the TVA announced its intention to construct an Advanced Pressurized Water Reactor at its Bellefonte site in Alabama, filing the necessary applications in November 2007.

In 2009, to gain more access to sustainable, green energy, TVA signed 20-year power purchase agreements with Maryland-based CVP Renewable Energy Co.

Under the terms of the agreement, TVA was required to retire at least 18 of its 59 coal-fired units by the end of 2018, and install scrubbers in several others or convert them to make them cleaner, at a cost of $25 billion, by 2021.

In 2018, TVA opened a new cybersecurity center in its downtown Chattanooga Office Complex.

TVA announced in April 2021 plans to completely phase out coal power by 2035.

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The following month, the TVA board voted to consider replacing almost all of their operating coal facilities with combined-cycle gas plants.

In early February 2020, TVA awarded an outside company, Framatome, several multi-million-dollar contracts for work across the company's reactor fleet.

The move came after U S Tech Workers, a nonprofit that works to limit visas given to foreign technology workers, criticized the TVA for laying off its own workers and replacing them with contractors using foreign workers with H-1B visas.

Seven TVA Megasites have been developed so far with capital investments of over $5 billion.

TVA was heralded by New Dealers and the New Deal Coalition not only as a successful economic development program for a depressed area but as a democratic nation-building effort overseas because of its alleged grassroots inclusiveness as articulated by director David E Lilienthal.

However, the TVA was controversial early on, as some believed its creation was an overreach by the federal government.

Supporters of TVA note that the agency's management of the Tennessee River system without appropriated federal funding saves federal taxpayers millions of dollars annually.

The TVA bill was passed in 1933 because reformers like Norris skillfully coordinated action at potential choke points and weakened the already disorganized opponents among the electric power industry lobbyists.

The United States Supreme Court ruled TVA to be constitutional in Ashwander v Tennessee Valley Authority in 1936.

The U S Supreme Court again upheld the TVA Act in its 1939 decision Tennessee Electric Power Company v TVA.

An out-of-court settlement of the lawsuit was reached in 1987, in which TVA agreed to contract modifications and paid the group $5 million but admitted no wrongdoing.

TVA has received criticism its entire history for what some have perceived as excessive use of its authority of eminent domain and an unwillingness to compromise with landowners.

TVA'storians have criticized the TVA for forcing residents to sell their property at values less than the fair market value, and indirectly starting a unstable real estate market for farmland.

On some occasions, land that TVA had acquired through eminent domain that was expected to be flooded by reservoirs was not flooded, and was given away to private developers.

TVA still has a dominant presence in Northern Alabama, including Isbell's hometown of Muscle Shoals, as an employer and power distributor.