Grant Supported By Cantwell & Gluesenkamp Perez Will “Keep the Lights On” in the Oldest Retirement Community in the U.S.

Grant Supported By Cantwell & Gluesenkamp Perez Will "Keep the Lights On" in the Oldest Retirement Community in the U.S.

Cowlitz County's remote retirement village of Ryderwood to be served by underground power lines, solving persistent power outage issues

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA), ranking member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, and senior member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, and U.S. Representative Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D, WA-03) celebrated news that Cowlitz Public Utility District has received $3 million in combined federal and state grant funding to relocate and underground a 5.4-mile distribution power line serving the senior citizen community of Ryderwood and nearby rural areas in Cowlitz and Lewis Counties.

"By helping Cowlitz Public Utility District move more than 5 miles of power lines underground, this project will virtually eliminate power outages and ensure reliability during storms. This is exactly why we fought to secure historic grid resilience investments in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law: To modernize aging infrastructure and protect vulnerable communities from increasingly severe weather. For the hundreds of seniors who live in Ryderwood - many of whom are reliant on electric medical devices or confined to their homes - this project could be lifesaving," Sen. Cantwell said.

"For many, a power outage is an inconvenience. For seniors in Ryderwood, timber, ice, windstorms and remoteness can quickly turn a power outage deadly. These funds for critical undergrounding will improve power supply and lower energy cost across the region, freeing up our linemen for less predictable emergency winter repairs," said Rep. Gluesenkamp Perez.

The funding includes $1.15 million secured by Sen. Cantwell and Rep. Gluesenkamp Perez in the final version of the Fiscal Year 2026 Homeland Security Appropriations Bill. The appropriation supplements a $1.9 million Washington Grid Resilience Program Grant awarded by the Washington State Department of Commerce, using federal grid resilience funds from the U.S. Department of Energy.

The U.S. Department of Energy's Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnerships (GRIP) program was authorized by the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL). The BIL included multiple historic investments championed by Sen. Cantwell to make our nation's electricity grid more reliable, resilient, and able to integrate renewable energy sources and stand up to increasingly frequent and intense weather events.

Ryderwood is an isolated former logging town that was turned into a retirement community in 1953. It is believed to be the first planned retirement community in the U.S. The town gets its power from transmission lines that pass through a densely forested abandoned railroad corridor. Between 2016 and 2025, the line experienced 38 outages over 29 days, averaging 7.2 hours per outage, including winter storm events lasting up to 18 hours. These outages pose heightened risks for Ryderwood's elderly population, many of whom depend on electricity for heating, medical devices, and communications.

The project will reduce wildfire risk, prevent extended outages during severe weather, and improve electric reliability for more than 700 rural residents, most of whom are seniors.

"Cowlitz PUD is pleased to receive Grid Resilience funding to help keep the lights on for the rural senior citizen community of Ryderwood and reduce wildfire risk in this remote, forested area," said Cowlitz PUD General Manager Gary Huhta. "Extreme weather and high wind events have repeatedly disrupted electric service, resulting in extended outages when reliable power is needed most. This funding will allow us to virtually eliminate these outages and mitigate wildfire risk by undergrounding the power line serving Ryderwood and nearby rural residents."