PGE Announces Intent to Join Regional Energy Market to Access New Resources and Provide Cost Savings for Customers

Portland General Electric took a significant next step toward an integrated regional system today, announcing its intent to join the California Independent System Operator’s (CAISO) Extended Day-Ahead Market (EDAM) to help lower power costs, increase resilience and access more clean energy sources from across the West. PGE’s decision follows years of collaborative work shaping regional market options and months of engagement in the stakeholder process to develop the EDAM and an alternative offering. The EDAM is expected to begin operating in 2026.

Here are three things to know about PGE’s decision:

1. It will allow PGE and participating utilities greater access to the least costly and cleanest energy available. Participants bid their anticipated energy demand and generating resources into a market pool the day ahead of expected usage so the market can optimize generation resources and the energy needed for participating utilities.

2. It continues PGE’s commitment to affordable energy. Anticipated gross cost savings range from $6 million to $18 million annually, based on current modeling and depending on the final number of EDAM participants. The technology, systems and transmission system for this project are already in place, allowing PGE to connect to regional resources across a common market, from hydropower and wind in the Pacific Northwest to solar in California and the desert Southwest.

3. It builds on the success of the Western Energy Imbalance Market (WEIM), a real-time, wholesale energy market that PGE joined in 2017 and that produces cost savings for PGE customers, more integration of renewable power and better grid reliability.

More information on PGE’s EDAM decision can be found here .