Under the leadership of David E. Lilienthal, the TVA also became the global model for the United States' later efforts to help modernize agrarian societies in the developing world.

[11] TVA provides electricity to approximately ten million people through a diverse portfolio that includes nuclear, coal-fired, natural gas-fired, hydroelectric, and renewable generation.

[10] TVA's headquarters are located in Downtown Knoxville, with large administrative offices in Chattanooga (training/development; supplier relations; power generation and transmission) and Nashville (economic development) in Tennessee and Muscle Shoals, Alabama.

[14] When their terms expire, directors may remain on the board until the end of the current congressional session (typically in December) or until their successors take office, whichever comes first.

[16] In fiscal year 2020, nuclear generation made up about 41% of TVA's total energy production, natural gas 26%, coal 14%, hydroelectric 13%, and wind and solar 3%.

Day-Use Recreation Areas comprise approximately 80 different locations throughout the Tennessee Valley largely concentrated on or near TVA reservoirs that include water access points, campgrounds, hiking trails, fishing piers, and equestrian facilities.

[26] In the late 19th century, the Army Corps of Engineers first recognized a number of potential dam sites along the Tennessee River for electricity generation and navigation improvements.

[27] The National Defense Act of 1916, signed into law by President Woodrow Wilson, authorized the construction of a hydroelectric dam on the Tennessee River in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, for the purpose of producing nitrates for ammunition.

[29] During his 1932 presidential campaign, Franklin D. Roosevelt expressed his belief that private utilities had "selfish purposes" and said, "Never shall the federal government part with its sovereignty or with its control of its power resources while I'm President of the United States."

[30] In 1930, Norris sponsored the Muscle Shoals Bill, which would have built a federal dam in the valley, but it was vetoed by President Herbert Hoover, who believed it to be socialistic.

[31] The idea behind the Muscle Shoals project became a core part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal program that created the Tennessee Valley Authority.

At the same time, however, they required the displacement of more than 125,000 valley residents or roughly 15,000 families,[7] as well as some cemeteries and small towns, which caused some to oppose the projects, especially in rural areas.

After negotiations led by then-Vice President Harry Truman, TVA purchased the land from Nantahala Power and Light, a wholly owned subsidiary of Alcoa, and built Fontana Dam.

However, the abundance of TVA power was one of the major factors in the decision by the U.S. Army to locate uranium enrichment facilities in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, for the world's first atomic bombs.

[47][48] By the end of World War II, TVA had completed a 650-mile (1,050 km) navigation channel the length of the Tennessee River and had become the nation's largest electricity supplier.

The Tellico Dam project was initially delayed because of concern over the snail darter, a small ray-finned fish which had been discovered in the Little Tennessee River in 1973 and listed as an endangered species two years later.

[66] A lawsuit was filed under the Endangered Species Act and the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of protecting the snail darter in Tennessee Valley Authority v. Hill in 1978.

It cut operating costs by nearly $800 million a year, reduced its workforce by more than half, increased the generating capacity of its plants, and developed a plan to meet the energy needs of the Tennessee Valley through 2020.

The following year, the company announced its intention to construct an Advanced Pressurized Water Reactor at its Bellefonte site in Alabama, filing the necessary applications in November 2007.

[87] Under the terms of the agreement, TVA was required to retire at least 18 of its 59 coal-fired units by the end of 2018, and install scrubbers in several others or convert them to make them cleaner, at a cost of $25 billion, by 2021.

[98][99] TVA was heralded by New Dealers and the New Deal Coalition not only as a successful economic development program for a depressed area but also as a democratic nation-building effort overseas because of its alleged grassroots inclusiveness as articulated by director David E. Lilienthal.

[101] Business historian Thomas McCraw concludes that Roosevelt "rescued the [power] industry from its own abuses" but "he might have done this much with a great deal less agitation and ill will".

[102] New Dealers hoped to build numerous other federal utility corporations around the country but were defeated by lobbyist and 1940 Republican presidential nominee Wendell Willkie and the conservative coalition in Congress.

[103] The TVA bill was able to attain passage because reformers like Norris skillfully coordinated action at potential choke points and weakened the already disorganized opponents among the electric power industry lobbyists.

[28] In 1936, after regrouping, opposing river lobbyists and members of congress who were part of the conservative coalition took advantage of the New Dealers' spending mood by expanding the Army Corps' flood control program.

[103] When Democrats after 1945 began proclaiming the Tennessee Valley Authority as a model for countries in the developing world to follow, conservative critics charged that it was a top-heavy, centralized, technocratic venture that displaced locals and did so in insensitive ways.

Senator and Republican presidential candidate Barry Goldwater was quoted in a Saturday Evening Post article by Stewart Alsop as saying, "You know, I think we ought to sell TVA."

As a result, a class action suit was filed in 1984 in U.S. District Court charging the agency with sex discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 based on the large number of women in one of the pay grades negatively impacted by the new contract.

[125][126] The 1960 film Wild River, directed by Elia Kazan, tells the story about a family forced to relocate from their land, which has been owned by their ancestors for generations, after TVA plans to construct a dam which will flood it.

[38][127] The 1970 James Dickey novel Deliverance and its 1972 film adaptation focuses on four Atlanta businessmen taking a canoeing trip down a river that is being impounded by an electric utility, nodding to the TVA's early and controversial hydroelectric projects.