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Big Cliff

Hydro power plant · Marion County, Oregon

Nameplate capacity
18 MW
Rank in Oregon
#86
of 301 plants
In service since
1954
December 1954

Details

Primary fuel
Hydro
Technology
Conventional Hydroelectric
Operator
USACE Northwestern Division
County
Marion County
Generating units
1
Share of state capacity
0.09%
Rank among hydro plants in Oregon
#28 of 63
EIA plant code
3074

Generating units

Individual generating units at Big Cliff
UnitTechnologyNameplateSummerOnlineStatus
1Conventional Hydroelectric18 MW21 MW1954Out of service but expected to return to service in next calendar year

Nameplate is the maximum rated output; summer capacity is what the unit can reliably deliver on a hot day, which is typically lower.

Similarly sized plants in Oregon

About this data

From EIA’s inventory of operable generators, May 2026 release. Capacity is nameplate — the maximum rated output of the equipment, not what the plant actually generates over a year, which depends on how often it runs. A 18 MW solar plant and a 18 MW nuclear plant have the same entry here and produce very different amounts of electricity.

“In service since” is the earliest in-service date among the units still listed, so a site rebuilt around newer equipment can read as younger than the site itself. All Oregon power plants · What Oregon actually generates