A Washington tribe builds solar microgrids against power outages
The Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, a 1.4 million acre reservation in northeastern Washington enrolling 9,132 descendants of 12 tribes, announced a partnership in November 2025 with Open Access Technology International, a company known as OATI, to build solar and battery microgrids, systems that can disconnect from the wider power grid and keep running on their own during an outage. Outages on the reservation average 6 days a year, sometimes significantly higher, and chairman Jarred Michael Erickson says the reservation location, exposed to winter storms and wildfires, has always made a reliable supply of power hard to sustain.
Our hope is that this microgrid technology will not only keep our lights on, but will also position us for new economic opportunities.
Jarred Michael Erickson, chairman of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation. Source 1.
3 sites planned now, a fourth later
Underscore Native News, reporting weeks after the partnership was announced, describes 3 microgrids as the current plan, at the tribal government complex in Nespelem, the Paschal Sherman Indian School near Omak, and the Inchelium District, with a fourth site planned later for the Keller District, the fourth of the reservation legislative districts. The systems run on GridMind, a resource management platform built by OATI, so a critical building can disconnect from the wider grid and keep lights, refrigeration and medical equipment running when an outage hits.
Inside the first 3 microgrids
The largest of the 3, the Nespelem site, is designed for 2.2 megawatts of total capacity, combining 300 to 600 kilowatts of rooftop and carport solar with 1.9 megawatts and 3.9 megawatt hours of battery storage, backed by a 2 megawatt backup generator, according to Microgrid Knowledge. The Paschal Sherman Indian School and the Inchelium site each plan 400 to 600 kilowatts of solar, with the same 1.9 megawatts and 3.9 megawatt hours of battery storage as Nespelem.
Solar capacity for the Paschal Sherman Indian School and Inchelium sites is reported as one shared range for each, 400 to 600 kilowatts, not a single precise figure.
Show the numbers
| Nespelem | 300 to 600 kilowatts solar |
| Paschal Sherman Indian School | 400 to 600 kilowatts solar |
| Inchelium | 400 to 600 kilowatts solar |
All 3 sites also plan the same battery energy capacity, 3.9 megawatt hours, according to Microgrid Knowledge.
Show the numbers
| Nespelem | 1.9 |
| Paschal Sherman Indian School | 1.9 |
| Inchelium | 1.9 |
What the grants pay for, and what they do not
Residents on the reservation typically pay 500 to 600 dollars a month for power, according to OATI, one reason the tribe wants to eventually sell surplus power rather than only buy it. Washington State separately awarded the tribe 1,137,000 dollars in March 2026 from the Climate Commitment Act, part of a 16,810,568 dollar round reaching 17 tribal communities statewide, but state records show that grant pays for an electric boat for salmon harvest, cultural site visits and youth education, not the microgrids. No source discloses a total dollar figure for the microgrid project itself, only that it draws on a mix of federal and state grants.
A first step toward energy sovereignty
It's kind of that first step towards energy sovereignty.
Jarred Michael Erickson, chairman of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation. Source 5.