As one of the major players in reservoir and Lake management Donald Trump will soon get to name new directors to the TVA. These appointments could take place by May 18th. What does this mean for your summer of Lake Fun? Probably not much. While we do expect some reform on how the agency is run at the upper echelon the recreational impact on any TVA managed lakes and reservoirs we expect to be minor.
However, we do forsee the privatization of TVA in the next 2-5 year period. For recreational purposes we see this to be a positive. A government owned TVA that was created after the Great Depression has little to no use on today’s recreational waters. A shift in selling current assets to Duke Energy and other private energy companies has been slowly taking place over the past decade under the dark of night. Also if you look at many of TVA’s executives they come from nearby energy companies who will no doubt try to bring the TVA lakes and reservoirs into their fold.
Rick Perry was named head of the Department of Energy so I would expect him to have major say in which direction the TVA takes. My bet is privatization in the short term.