CA: Plan for more coal energy in Nevada runs into Calif. opposition (including Gubinor 'GanGReen')

Bakersfield Californian ^ | 6/15/05 | Garance Burke - AP

[NormsRevenge]

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - Plans to build a coal-fired power plant in Nevada's high desert to provide more energy for Southern Californians are opposed by renewable energy advocates and may also run afoul of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's new effort to fight global warming.

At a joint public hearing Wednesday by the California Energy Commission and Public Utilities Commission, energy officials were expected to debate whether Schwarzenegger's greenhouse gas reduction goals will impact companies generating electricity outside California. Nevada, where environmental regulations tend to be more lax, already has several power plants supplying energy to California, and there are plans to build three more.

Energy companies have seen Nevada as a natural location from which to supply California's seemingly insatiable need for electricity, but a string of recent decisions by California regulators and officials is calling into question the viability of fossil fuel plants.

On June 1, Schwarzenegger vowed to cut California's greenhouse gas emissions to 2000 levels by 2010. While the governor issued no specific policies, the state Public Utilities Commission ordered utilities in December to consider coming environmental regulations when signing long-term contracts for power made from coal and natural gas.

The rules frustrate California's major utilities - they want a national energy policy, not state mandates.

"Greenhouse gas reductions should be addressed on a national level in a manner that's productive and industry-neutral," said Art Larson, a spokesman for Sempra Energy, which seeks to build a coal-fired power plant in Nevada's Black Rock Desert Wilderness.

Because greenhouse gases don't stop at state lines, environmental advocates hope the Schwarzenegger administration will instead add California's bureaucratic muscle to enforce his bold anti-pollution plan. Before Wednesday's meeting, they were pleased by what they heard from one of the governor's top energy advisers.

"The PUC procurement rules apply to investor-owned procurement whether they are considering in- or out-of-state resources," Joe Desmond, the governor's spokesman on energy matters, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

Should California's regulatory authority extend to companies based in Nevada, one of the first projects to be impacted is Sempra's proposed coal-fired plant near Gerlach, Nev., which would cost $2 billion to bring online.

The plant has been criticized by environmental groups as well as hordes of partygoers from the San Francisco Bay area who visit the desert each year for the Burning Man festival. San Francisco's Board of Supervisors passed a resolution Tuesday to oppose the plant's construction.

"It's another important signal that this is a wrong-headed project that needs to come to a speedy halt," said Supervisor Aaron Peskin. "Thousands of San Franciscans understand the beauty of Black Rock desert, and it's our responsibility to voice our opposition to the plant."

The resolution, which passed unanimously, urges the city of Los Angeles to reject Sempra Energy's application to the Department of Water and Power to tap the regional transmission line it partially owns to carry electricity across the border to California.

Other energy companies hope to harness northwest Nevada's wind and geothermal resources. The transmission line currently has enough excess capacity to carry energy from fossil fuel sources, or renewable sources, but not both.

[Dog Gone]

It's not terribly amusing to hear my wife's sister, a teacher in a California elementary school, worry about how to afford to keep her own kids from attending the school at which she teaches.

It's not like it's an inner city school. Her whole city has a population of less than 50,000.

My sister-in-law doesn't like the curriculum, the changing demographics, or the quality of education provided by the school district. She votes Republican, if you hadn't already guessed.

[Carry_Okie]

The paycheck protection measure on the ballot may be our last chance to save this state.

Why they don't just enforce Communications Workers v. Beck, I just don't understand. Enforcing the law shouldn't require a ballot measure.

[Dog Gone]

A ballot measure doesn't end the matter in California as I'm sure you well know.

We've got to get control of the 9th Circuit. Those lunatics are the cause of half your problems.

[commonasdirt]

".....environmental groups as well as hordes of partygoers from the San Francisco Bay area who visit the desert each year for the Burning Man festival. "

Oh yes, god forbid providing enough power for people to live interfere with the Burning Man Festival.

As a person who worked in a coal fired power plant in Alaska for 17 years I would like to read more about the technology to be utilized at the proposed plant. No doubt it is MUCH better environmentally then the 1937 design of the plant I worked in till '88

[calex59]

Yes, I am denying it as one of those contituents. The majority, acreagewise, of CA is Red. We have the blue areas along the coast which house the illegals, the libs and the minorities. All of them ignorant and dependent on government to see them through. The majority of CA residents do not want all these things and when we actually get an initiative on the ballot, such as a gun ban, we always vote it out, or in if it is beneficial, which they rarely are.

The problem is, even the red areas think that dems are honest and they continue to vote for dem senators, plus the lines are drawn to favor Dems.

The reason the Pres didn't do any better here is the Republicans give up and don't go to the polls as they should. We need people to spark the voters and to convince the blacks that the dems are not their frineds but their enemies. If we can do that we can turn this rotten state around. One more thing, we need the illegals to be sent back across the border.