Lower Granite

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Northwestern Division)Whitman CountyBPAT

Lower Granite Dam is a conventional hydroelectric facility on the Snake River in Whitman County, Washington, with five operating turbine-generator units totaling 675 MW of nameplate capacity. It is owned by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and, as reported in EIA-860, sits on the BPAT balancing authority, consistent with the plant's own price nodes near Lewiston/Pomeroy, WA. The dam is <cite index="10-1">part of the Columbia River Basin system of dams, built and operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, with power generated distributed by the Bonneville Power Administration</cite>. <cite index="11-4">Authorized under the 1945 Rivers and Harbors Act and completed in 1975, Lower Granite Lock and Dam was the last of four Corps dams built on the lower Snake River</cite>, and USACE rates its <cite index="11-2">six-turbine powerhouse as able to generate up to 810 megawatts of hydroelectricity</cite>, though in practice <cite index="18-11">the turbines rarely all run at the same time or at maximum capacity due to recent regulations to protect salmon</cite>. Lower Granite is one of four Lower Snake River dams that has been the subject of a long-running removal debate; in December 2023 <cite index="4-8">the Biden administration announced its support for preparing to breach the four Lower Snake River Dams through an agreement with four tribal nations, two states and several conservation groups</cite>, but <cite index="4-2">actually breaching them would require an act of Congress</cite>, so the dam continues to operate today with no unit retired and no scheduled plant closure.