TVA economic development reaches record $8.5 billion in 2014

photo John Bradley, TVA
Arkansas-St. John's Live Blog

NASHVILLE - The Tennessee Valley Authority helped recruit a record $8.5 billion of business investment in fiscal 2014, surpassing TVA's previous record set prior to the recession in 2007.

TVA estimates the projects it helped encourage in the past year retained or added 60,300 jobs in the fiscal year ended Sept. 30.

TVA estimates that the investments in Southeast Tennessee, and the Georgia and North Carolina portions of TVA's service territory, totaled $1.4 billion. Those projects will help generate 7,000 new jobs.

John Bradley, the director of economic development for TVA, said major projects by Hankook Tire, Volkswagen and other automotive-related manufacturers helped produce the record investment in 2014.

"The Valley Investment Initiative program we launched five years ago has helped us to work with industry to retain and grow many businesses in our region," Bradley said today.

Bradley said TVA has maintained 99.999 percent reliability with an average of less than 4 minutes of power outages a year for the distributors and major industries it directly serves.

"Reliabillity is vital for industry and our diverse power mix (coal, nuclear, gas, hydro) helps us achieve that," he said.

Bradley said TVA works with local power companies and regional, state and local economic development agencies to attract new companies and investments. The 2014 results were more than 20 percent above the utility's targets for the year.

TVA's previous record for new investment was just over $5.5 billion set in 2007.

"Economic development is a core component of TVA's mission to serve and and improve the quality of life of the 9 million residents in the Valley," TVA CEO BIll Johnson said in a statement today.

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