Oh come one, that's small box thinking, you gotta look at the big picture. LA has a larger electricity demand than portland and it oscillates in a different pattern than portland. In the summer, due to AC, LA needs more peak capacity. However in the winter, the equation flips and now Portland needs that capacity to heat homes. Keeping all that hydro in washington to support the comparitively teensy population of 650k in portland is a waste, especially when demand is needed down south and not in the north and vice versa; this line serves 3 million in LA and represents half the LADWP peak capacity. I'd argue cutting LA off would force more coal plants to open than what is needed to electrify portland today.