ORS 215.141 Energy resilience plans

The Legislative Assembly finds that each county should plan for and develop energy resilience and be prepared, in the event of major grid disruption, to maintain basic services and functions.

In order to carry out the provisions set forth in subsection (1) of this section, a county may:

Develop and adopt an energy resilience plan; and

Incorporate the energy resilience plan into the county’s applicable natural hazard mitigation plan.

An energy resilience plan developed under this section must:

Be based on and plan for short-term, medium-term and long-term power outages;

Identify and map:

Existing energy infrastructure located within the county, including transmission lines, distribution lines, substations and energy storage systems;

Natural hazard risks; and

Communities that experience social vulnerability;

Identify potential locations for community resilience centers and communication zones that the public may use to access electricity services during a power outage;

Inventory the energy consumption needs of critical public services facilities;

Identify critical public services facilities where the development of alternate energy generation and storage resources will meet local energy resilience needs;

Identify opportunities to coordinate and locate energy infrastructure development to align with and support critical public services facilities;

Identify time schedules, priorities and potential funding sources for developing energy resilience; and

Identify other actions and resources needed to implement the energy resilience plan.

To identify and map communities that experience social vulnerabilities under subsection (3)(b)(C) of this section, a county shall consult with representatives from local environmental justice communities.

A county shall use the locations of communities that experience social vulnerabilities to prioritize the potential locations of community resilience centers under subsection (3)(c) of this section.

A public utility that is operating or serving customers within the boundaries of a county that is developing an energy resilience plan shall use reasonable efforts to assist with and comply with requests from the county for information regarding energy infrastructure that is located or serving customers within the boundaries of the county, provided that the information is exempt from disclosure under ORS 192.355.

As used in this section, “critical public services facility” includes a facility related to law enforcement, fire protection, health and medical services, sanitation services, fuel and fueling, public works and engineering, public information and communications and emergency response.