You can take short-term action, control prices, complain about politics or salmon or the flaws of deregulation, and that basic problem will not change. In the short term Gov. Gary Locke and others have called on the federal government to impose temporary caps on wholesale power prices. For brief relief this is not a bad plan. The incredible spikes in wholesale power prices are dangerous and have moved beyond reason. But caps should be short-lived.
Price controls accomplish nothing in the long term.
They may penalize the Northwest to solve a problem in California, and discourage new power production, which is the real solution. Other short-term steps are more questionable. Energy Secretary Bill Richardson Wednesday ordered the Bonneville Power Administration to sell power to California. This avoided blackouts there, and it is supposed to be an exchange with California that does not draw down the Northwest's reservoirs. But the Northwest should be on guard, or our power for next year will be shipped to California this year.