Four environmental groups Wednesday called for a federal investigation of newly uncovered records that show the Tennessee Valley Authority paid $3 million of ratepayer money to support organizations that have lobbied to oppose or limit some air pollution regulations in the past.
TVA insists none of the membership dues paid to the trade associations involved funding litigation or lobbying efforts by the organizations against stricter environmental rules or regulations. The federal utility, which is prohibited from lobbying Congress on public policy issues, contends that the money paid to such groups as the Utility Air Regulatory Group, the Edison Electric Institute and the Nuclear Energy Institute were for informational and technical support, not influencing public policy.
“Our agreements with these various groups prevented any funding that TVA provided for either lobbying or litigation purposes,” TVA spokesman Jim Hopson said. “In fact, these groups did not lobby or litigate on TVA’s behalf or in our name while we were associated with them.”
Hopson TVA joined with other investor-owned utilities in the trade groups for technical support and information sharing on best practices in the industry “and by learning from other utilities we can save our ratepayers money because TVA was not having to solely fund all the benefits we got from these collective efforts.”
But Daniel Tait, director of Energy Alabama who obtained records of TVA payments to the groups through a 2019 lawsuit filed on behalf of the Energy and Policy Institute, said his records request uncovered hundreds of emails, calendar invitations, budget documents, and billing details about payments from TVA to the law firm of Hunton Andrews Kurth.