This is an excerpt from EERE Network News, a weekly electronic newsletter.

August 14, 2013

Tacoma Completes Major Hydropower Upgrade at Cushman Dam

The Energy Department and the city of Tacoma on August 7 inaugurated a new powerhouse and fish passage facility at its Cushman Hydroelectric Project in Washington State, powering over 2,000 additional homes and reintroducing steelhead and salmon to their native habitats.

Tacoma Power's Cushman Hydroelectric Project installed a new two-generator powerhouse that increases electric generation capacity by 3.6 megawatts and captures energy from previously untapped water flows. The project also added an innovative elevator and transportation system to reintroduce Washington's endangered steelhead and salmon populations upriver from the Cushman Hydroelectric Project for the first time since the 1920s. This $28 million project was supported by a $4.7 million American Recovery and Reinvestment Act award from the Energy Department. See the Energy Department Progress Alert.