Hodel Praised Even by His Political Foes

Donald Paul Hodel, chosen by President Reagan to head the Interior Department, is an affable man who has been a skillful advocate of the Administration’s policies while retaining the respect of his political foes.

When controversial James G. Watt was secretary of the Interior, for example, Hodel was his undersecretary, quietly running the day-to-day operations of the department and assiduously avoiding any visible disputes.

Hodel left the Interior Department in November, 1982, to assume his current post as energy secretary, taking over a department whose political importance has declined as the energy crisis of the mid-1970s has eased.

Within days of stepping into the job, Hodel met with members of conservation and environmental groups to hear complaints about the Administration’s energy policies. Then, as now, even staunch opponents of Administration efforts to promote nuclear power and spend less for federal conservation programs praised Hodel’s open-door policy and his polite demeanor.

“He . . . has allowed the most access by all viewpoints,” said Scott Sklar, director of government relations at the Solar Energy Industries Assn., a trade group. “We will miss him.”

Despite hard work and harmonious relations with individual members of Congress, Hodel failed to win acceptance of one of the Administration’s top-priority energy issues--the legislative removal of all federal price controls from natural gas.

But his department did obtain congressional approval of major legislation to select sites for permanent disposal of radioactive waste from the nation’s commercial nuclear plants.

And he has helped expand the strategic petroleum reserve, caverns filled with oil for use if the United States suffers a cutoff of foreign supplies.

Some controversy could be generated at Hodel’s confirmation hearings for the Interior Department post by his 1972-77 tenure as head of the federal Bonneville Power Administration, which supplies electricity in the Northwest.

Hodel, an ardent advocate of nuclear power, played a key role in the development of the Washington Public Power Supply System, which ultimately was forced to cancel two partly finished nuclear plants, incurring billions of dollars in losses for bondholders.

Hodel, a 49-year-old native of Portland, Ore., is a former attorney and energy consultant. He is an avid skier.