Energy Northwest’s Columbia Generating Station received USA’s Optimizer Award at the 2015 USA Executive Summit Thursday. During calendar year 2014, Columbia saved more than $9 million through the use of USA’s programs and contracts.

This is the first time Energy Northwest received the Optimizer Award. During 2014, the agency achieved $1.5 million in savings through participation in the USA loaned employee, Fukushima response and the obsolescence replacement programs. Columbia saved another half million dollars through active participation in USA’s nuclear safety culture assessment and decay heat removal hardening projects.

“Most significantly, the agency saved more than $5 million on replacement breaker costs through the use of an Alliance purchasing agreement,” said Jim Kitchens, USA Supply Chain management.

While USA’s 2014 fleet-wide savings averaged $5.5 million per member, Columbia achieved total net savings and avoided costs of more than $9 million.

The Optimizer Award was created several years ago, in order to recognize the member utility which leveraged the most out of their alliance membership. The award is presented each year to the USA fleet member that achieves the greatest net savings and avoids costs through the aggressive use of the various alliance opportunities.