PG&E

Newsom, Eric Jaye and PG&E

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The following is an email exchange between me and Nathan Ballard, the mayor’s press secretary, on the subject of the Clean Energy Act. It raises some interesting questions; I thought I’d just post it without further comment.

ME: Will Mayor Newsom be endorsing the Clean Energy Act?

NATHAN BALLARD: Check with Jaye.

ME: Thanks, I will. A private political consultant is now speaking for the mayor on policy positions?

BALLARD: I don’t use public resources/time to comment about endorsements on ballot measures, candidate races, etc. Eric Jaye is Newsom’s point of contact for the media on such issues.

ME: Interesting. How long as this been your policy? (And by the way, I don’t think the Clean Energy Act is a ballot measure yet. It’s still before the board of supervisors. So you can’t speak for the mayor about his positions
on pending legislation?)

I’m also intrigued by the possibility of serious conflicts here. Eric Jaye is often involved in local political campaigns as a paid consultant. Should he be speaking for the mayor if he is getting paid to take one side on an issue?

BALLARD: Yes, I can speak for the Mayor on pending legislation. Once it’s on the ballot, I probably shouldn’t. Anyways, I don’t know of any local legislation called the Clean Energy Act. Do send me the text and I’ll see
if the Mayor wants to express an opinion to you about it.

As to your question about Eric Jaye, it sounds like you are suggesting that he is doing something wrong. I know and respect Eric, and so I know that you are on the wrong track. His professional ethics are unimpeachable. But
instead of spreading rumors about Eric through third parties, why don’t you just pick up the phone and call him with your accusations? I am confident that he will be quite happy to set you straight.

ME: Eric Jaye informs me that since he is, in fact, working for PG&E in opposition to the Clean Energy Act, he has a conflict (as I had suspected) and can’t speak for the mayor on this issue.

There was a hearing on the measure this week, and I’m sure the mayor is aware of it and what it entails. Can you let me know if he has taken a position or plans to?

Thanks for your help.

BALLARD: The Mayor says he is aware of this legislation and he is looking into it.

I’m for PG&E, at 50 bucks a head

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If public power can work in Rock Rapids, Iowa, why can’t it work in San Francisco?

By Bruce B. Brugmann

When I came into yesterday’s public hearing at City hall on the emerging clean energy act initiative, I wasn’t surprised to see the room stacked with people obviously rounded up by PG&E for the occasion. After 42 years of covering PG&E, I know how private utility operates.

I asked the man sitting next to me, obviously not a
City Hall regular, why he was attending the hearing. His answer was vague but he was obviously agitated about the clean energy act initiative. Was he going to testify against the initiative? Yes, he said. Was he paid to attend the hearing?
He mumbled a bit and then said, yes, $50 bucks. But, he pointed out, he hadn’t been paid yet.

The word got around the hearing room that PG&E’s going rate for this hearing was $50. Julian Davis, the chair of the clean energy campaign, was first up to testify and promptly mentioned the going rate.
He then said that he considered it “cynical and tragic” for a corporation like PG&E to take advantage of communities of color into advocating on behalf of an agenda that ultimately does not serve their interests. (Many of the members of the audience were persons of color. Davis is black.)

Many of them testified, arguing that the initiative, which calls for setting renewable energy goals and making San Francisco the nation’s greenest clean energy city, would be too expensive and burdensome and ought to be killed forthwith. They testified that they couldn’t afford higher electric rates, higher taxes, higher anything in the city’s tight economy. Several said they were living on fixed incomes and simply could not afford another penny on anything.

Sup. Ross Mirkarimi, sponsor of the bill, and Sup. Chris Daly, chair of the rules committee meeting, Sup. Bevin Dufty, and many pro-clean energy speakers pointed out the many advantages of clean energy and public power. Cities with public power across the state and country had lower electric rates, better service, and extra money for their general funds. The Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) is a national leader in renewable energy and conservation efforts, while still keeping its rates far below PG&E rates in adjoining communities.

After hearing the clean energy speakers, several people came up to Davis after the hearing and said they were confused and annoyed that they had been misled by PG&E. They were interested in the arguments for clean energy and the initiative and wanted to know more.

Davis said he told them, among other things, that “one of the essential components of the clean energy act is a mandate to offer the kind of jobs and job training in the clean energy industry that PG&E is not currently offering to the very communities they are willing to exploit to promote their status quo agenda.” The jobs idea was of particular interest, he said.

And, yes, I testified at the hearing. I sometimes do this to counter the time worn PG&E line that, gosh, golly, gee, electricity is so complicated, city workers are so lazy, dumb, and incompetent, how in the world can they run an electrical company if they can’t make the muni run on time. Wheeze, wheeze, and wheeze again.

And so I pointed out that in my hometown of Rock Rapids, Iowa, population 2,800, a bedrock conservative Republican farming community way out in the northwestern part of the state,
the town has successfully operated a public utility since l896, and it’s doing just fine. It provides good, reliable, hometown electricity, has good low rates and excellent service, makes money for the general fund and subsidizes projects such as the local swimming pool, and doesn’t gratuitously cut off service with no way to appeal or complain, as is PG&E policy. And the public utility is locally accountable to a local board of directors composed of local townsfolk, such as my old friends Dave Foltz, a local real estate man, and Eugene Metzger, a local banker.

To this day, I told the supervisors, II always carry in my pocket a little blue coin purse that eloquently makes the local point. And I pulled the purse out of my pocket and read the inscription to the supervisors: “Call before you dig, Rock Rapids Municipal Utilities, (7l2) 472-2513.)”

And so my central argument is unbeatable: If public power works in Rock Rapids, Iowa, why can’t it work in San Francisco, California? PG&E has yet to get back to me on this one. Meanwhile, I’ll keep you posted throughout the campaign on public power in Rock Rapids. On guard, stay plugged in for the duration, the fun has just started, B3

Support SF’s Clean Energy Act

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EDITORIAL The long-awaited charter amendment that would transform San Francisco’s energy policy will come before the Board of Supervisors within the next few weeks. The measure, known as the Clean Energy Act, deserves strong support.

The proposal is fairly simple, but far-reaching. It includes ambitious targets for reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and a mandate that the city shift to entirely renewable electricity by 2040. That would turn Mayor Gavin Newsom’s green city rhetoric into enforceable reality and put the city where it ought to be — in the forefront of global efforts to end reliance on fossil fuels.

And the sponsors of the charter amendment, Sups. Ross Mirkarimi and Aaron Peskin, realize that the only way the city will ever get serious about sustainable energy programs is to get rid of Pacific Gas and Electric Co.’s monopoly and shift to a publicly-run local utility.

The measure would, for the first time, create a detailed municipal energy policy and put control of the city’s energy future in the hands of city officials, not those of a private corporation. The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission would have a mandate to ensure that by 2017, 51 percent of the electricity used in the city came from renewable sources. By 2030 that number would rise to 75 percent, and by 2040 the city would be seeking a 100 percent renewable portfolio. (Energy from the city’s existing Hetch Hetchy hydroelectric project would count as renewable power, and since Hetch Hetchy already covers a significant percent of the municipal load, the targets are entirely reasonable.)

The PUC would have to prepare a report every two years advising the supervisors on how it is moving to meet the targets.

The measure also directs the PUC to come up with a plan to put San Francisco into the business of retail electric power. That’s something activists have been pushing for since the 1920s. The federal law that gave the city the unique right to build a dam in a national park additionally mandated that San Francisco use the electricity from the dam to establish a public power system. The city has been in violation of the Raker Act for some 90 years now. As we’ve reported in numerous stories going back to 1969, the city built the dam in Yosemite and managed to construct a world-class municipal water system — but PG&E, through bribery, corruption, and political influence, hijacked the dam’s electric power. Although San Francisco is the only city in the nation with a federal public-power mandate and one of the few that owns and operates a major public hydroelectric project, residents and businesses are still stuck with PG&E’s soaring rates and lousy service.

And PG&E — which uses fossil fuels for much of its power and operates a nuclear plant — won’t make even the state’s mild mandate of 20 percent renewable energy by 2010.

Public power cities all over California have lower rates and better service. The Sacramento Municipal Utility District, one of the largest public power systems in the state, is a national leader on renewable energy and conservation efforts. And public power makes tremendous economic sense: a municipal utility would bring tens, maybe hundreds of millions of dollars per year into the city’s coffers. That money could be invested in solar, wind, and tidal energy, and some could go to reduce the structural budget deficit that haunts City Hall every year.

PG&E is already nervous about the prospect of a renewable energy and public power measure passing this fall, and has cranked up a campaign of lies and misinformation. The news media are already starting to pick up the pro-PG&E stance — the San Francisco Business Times is running a "poll" on public power that leads off with the tired old claim that "San Francisco can’t make the buses run on time. But it can find power to keep the lights on?" (A bit of reality here: urban bus systems are tough to run because they lose money. Public power systems make money. The lights stay on in Sacramento, Palo Alto, Los Angeles, Alameda, Santa Clara, and a lot of other cities — and the people who live there pay less, get more reliable service, and are more likely to see reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.)

Six votes are needed to put the Clean Energy Act on the ballot. Any supervisor who doesn’t support it will forever be known as someone who puts the interests of PG&E ahead of the needs of San Francisco, the nation, and the planet.

SOS: Vote here on phony PG&E poll

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By Bruce B. Brugmann (Scroll down to vote against PG&E and for the Clean Energy Act)

Already, even before the supervisors approve the new San Francisco Clean Energy Act, PG&E operatives are down the poles like firemen and women.

Their first strike is a poll in the July ll edition of the San Francisco Business Times, a link in the American City Business Journals chain, the nation’s largest publisher of metropolitan business journals, headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina. The Business Times did a poll for PG&E, a major advertiser, that poses these questions right out of the PG&E playbook with the same tired old PG&E arguments.

“Should voters be asked–for the fourth time in a decade–whether San Francisco should take over the city’s electric utility?

“”Yes. As Supervisor Mirkarimi says, San Francisco voters should finally back ‘removing the profit motive from the private sector delivery of electric service.

“”No, no, no…No. San Francisco can’t make the buses run on time. But it can find power to keep the lights on? Yeah, and maybe it could finance buying out PG&E by selling the Golden Gate Bridge.”

As attentive Guardian readers know, this is nonsense and the Business Times, as a paper that purports to write seriously about business and consumer issues, to act as the voice of PG&E so quickly and so cravenly even before the initiative is approved. Public power is the only new large potential revenue source for the city, would be much cheaper and cleaner than PG&E power, and would be locally accountable to the local public. More, it would finally bring the city into compliance with the federal Raker Act, which mandates public power for San Francisco because the Raker Act allowed the city a major concession to dam Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park for our water and power supply.

Cast your vote below. For early evidence of PG&E’s emerging campaign of lies, misdirection and astroturfing, read last week’s Guardian by Amanda Witherell. For the case to “Support SF’s Clean Energy plan,” read the editorial below in the Wednesday Guardian.

Alert: The Supervisors’ rules committee will hold a critical hearing on the initiative at 2 p.m. Wednesday at City Hall, Room 273, item eight on the agenda. Attend if you can and stay alert for more PG&E shenanigans. On guard, for the big battle ahead, B3, who is counting on the clean energy movement to knock out the Potrero HIll power plant tthat I see every day from my office window

Click here to vote in the San Francisco Business Times’ survey.

Click here for this week’s editorial, Support SF’s Clean Energy Act.

Click here to read last week’s article by Amanda Witherell titled, The dirty fight over clean power

The dirty fight over clean power

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› amanda@sfbg.com

A charter amendment for renewable energy and public power appears headed for the November ballot, and already Pacific Gas and Electric Co. is rounding up front groups and touting inaccurate figures in an attempt to scuttle the plan.

The San Francisco Clean Energy Act, introduced by Sup. Ross Mirkarimi, would mandate that the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission "produce a comprehensive plan for providing clean, secure, cost-effective electricity for city departments and residents and businesses."

If passed, San Francisco would exceed state standards by requiring 51 percent clean, renewable energy by 2017; 75 percent by 2030; and 100 percent by 2040. Workforce development is also part of the plan, and if it’s determined that public ownership of the grid is the way to go, any employees fired by PG&E will be hired by the SFPUC.

"The San Francisco Board of Supervisors is talking about taking over PG&E," Brandon Hernandez, the corporation’s manager of government relations, said at a June 27 Rules Committee hearing on the legislation. "PG&E’s system is not for sale," he asserted. He then went on to say a takeover would cost the city "at least $4 billion."

PG&E spokesperson Darlene Chiu told the Guardian: "That’s our estimate for what our system costs in San Francisco."

But the California State Board of Equalization says all of PG&E’s state-assessed San Francisco property was worth $1.2 billion in 2007. The board’s appraisers assess PG&E’s property for tax purposes and their final figure includes millions of dollars of property that San Francisco would not want to own.

PG&E threw other punches at the city. Hernandez threatened the loss of as much as $29 million per year in taxes and charitable giving. "We no longer will be contributing to San Francisco’s nonprofits and service organizations," he said of groups that received $5 million from PG&E last year.

That money buys some political loyalty. The only organizations that spoke against the measure — the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce, the Bay Area Council, and the A. Phillip Randolph Institute — all received bucks deluxe from PG&E. Between 2004 and 2006, the Chamber of Commerce Foundation received $166,000 from the utility; the Bay Area Council and Economic Forum grossed $132,500; and APRI banked slightly more than $100,000.

The Chamber’s vice president of public policy, Rob Black, criticized the move toward municipalization because it would make San Francisco, like other municipal utilities, exempt from the state-mandated 20 percent renewable energy by 2010. "The Los Angeles utility is at 48 percent coal. That’s not green, that’s not renewable. That’s something we need to be very careful about," he told the committee.

According to the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, their power mix is actually 44 percent coal. But Black didn’t bother to check; he just took his figures from PG&E moments before, while conferring with Hernandez and Chiu. When questioned by the Guardian, Black said, "They didn’t come to me. I went to them."

He reiterated the concern that municipally-owned power isn’t required by the state to be clean and green, and becoming so could increase rates. "If we’re creating cheaper energy, where’s the incentive to do conservation?" he asked.

According to statistics from the meeting, the average PG&E household spends $74.55 per month on electricity, with 12 percent of the energy used hailing from renewable resources. An equivalent customer in the Sacramento Municipal Utility District has a bill of $46.60 for 18 percent renewable.

APRI’s James Bryant said his Bayview community group has issues with the costs and the idea that former PG&E employees would be hired by the city and subsequently receive worse retirement plans.

When asked if he was there because his organization gets money from PG&E, Bryant said, "Not really." He added, "I don’t have anything to do with their decisions. They don’t have anything to do with my decisions.

"Of all the amoral things PG&E does, they fund very worthy grassroots organizations and then lean on them to speak against things," Sup. Tom Ammiano said when expressing his support for the legislation. "Not only is San Francisco going to have public power, the state of California is going to have public power."

Other public comments overwhelmingly supported the measure. Some energy activists have been concerned that the legislation would derail or delay efforts to move toward renewables through the community choice aggregation (CCA) program.

Peskin for DCCC chair

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EDITORIAL The San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee was the sleeper election in June: The Mark Leno–Carole Migden–Joe Nation contest for state Senate got a lot of attention, and the Bayview–Hunters Point redevelopment project got a huge amount of money, but only a small percentage of the voters got to the bottom of the ticket and chose the 24 people who will set policy for the local Democratic Party for the next two years. But a progressive slate won a significant number of seats. Now the DCCC has become a heated political battleground, with two candidates vying to become party chair.

The incumbent, Scott Wiener, leans toward the more moderate wing of the party, although he’s taken progressive stands on some issues. The challenger, Sup. Aaron Peskin, has the strong backing of many progressives.

The race has gotten a bit nasty: Sup. Chris Daly, a Peskin supporter, has sent out e-mail threatening the political future of committee members who don’t vote the right way. Both sides are lobbying furiously, with Leno helping Wiener and progressive leaders pushing Peskin. Right now it’s too close to call the election, which takes place later this month.

We’re not happy with the level of animosity here. We recognize that this isn’t the presidency of the United States, and that, thanks to the influence of the reform slate, the DCCC chair is no longer as powerful a position as it was in the days when the late Phil Burton and former Mayor Willie Brown controlled the party with an iron hand. And with the committee this closely split, neither candidate will be able to run an effective party operation this fall without working with both sides. So this shouldn’t be a political bloodbath.

We also recognize that neither candidate is perfect. We’ve disagreed with Peskin on a number of key issues, including Home Depot, and frankly, it’s not ideal to have the president of the Board of Supervisors also running the local Democratic Party.

But like any political contest, this ought to be decided on the issues — and on the future of the San Francisco Democratic Party. And Peskin is the clear choice.

If the DCCC did nothing but raise money, register voters, and push Democratic candidates, this wouldn’t be such an important fight. Weiner has done a perfectly fine job of keeping the party well funded and, under his tenure, 15,000 new Democratic voters have joined the ranks. But the party also endorses candidates and takes stands on ballot measures, and in close races — as some of the key battles will be this fall — the party’s support (which includes party money) can be significant.

And while the chair has only one vote, and can’t decide endorsements unilaterally, the person who runs the local party has a fair amount of influence over how money will be spent and how DCCC slate cards are managed; if the job didn’t matter, these two people (and their powerful allies) wouldn’t be fighting over it.

Peskin is on the right side of all the key fall contests. He’s backing progressive candidates for supervisor in the swing districts (John Avalos in District 11, Eric Mar in District 1, and David Chiu in District 3). He supports the housing justice initiative, is the cosponsor of the public power charter amendment, and the sponsor of two progressive tax measures. Wiener supports Ahsha Safai, the candidate of downtown and Mayor Gavin Newsom, in District 11. He hasn’t taken a position on public power, and told us he has "significant concerns" about the cost of the affordable housing measure, although he supports both of Peskin’s revenue proposals.

Wiener has been a reasonable and fair person as chair. But the issues matter. And if the San Francisco party is going to become a center for progressive activism, if the DCCC is going to be willing to challenge the state and national party and its leaders when necessary, take in the mayor when he’s wrong, and push the party to the left, putting a more activist progressive in the top slot is crucial.

It’s still possible a third candidate could come along. But for now the choices are Peskin and Wiener, and we urge progressives on the panel to support Aaron Peskin.

PS: As Amanda Witherell reports on page 14, PG&E is madly, desperately fighting to keep public power off the November ballot and is using every misleading figure and dirty trick possible. So the DCCC chair has to be willing to stand up to PG&E without hesitation or doubt.

Clean Energy Act excites supervisors

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At today’s Rules Committee, Supervisors Bevan Dufty, Tom Ammiano, and Chris Daly, all expressed enthusiasm for San Francisco’s Clean Energy Act. Daly and Ammiano even broke into chants of “victory, victory” during discussion of approving the measure for November’s ballot.

“In 2002 I supported Prop D and I look forward to supporting this measure,” said Dufty during his comments on this new public power ballot initiative. “I think PG&E has not held the public trust in San Francisco well,” he added, citing the smear campaign PG&E launched against Mark Leno during his bid for State Senate.

The measure, known as the “San Francisco Clean Energy Act,” would amend the city charter to require that, within 120 days of passing the legislation, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission must “produce a comprehensive plan for providing clean, secure, cost effective electricity for city departments and residents and businesses.” This may include construction city-owned transmission lines, as well as procuring the resources to advance the Community Choice Aggregation plan of 51 percent renewables by 2017.

It actually goes one step farther and says if CCA falls through, the city must still get 51 percent of their energy from renewable and clean sources, 75 percent by 2030, and 100 percent by 2040. A green jobs workforce development must also be part of the plan, and if it’s determined that public ownership of the grid and resources is the way to go, any employees fired by PG&E, the private company that provides our power now, will be hired by the PUC.

Sup. Ross MIrkarimi, who introduced the measure, rattled off figures from Alameda, Santa Clara, Palo Alto, and Sacramento, all of whom have publicly-owned utilities and all of whom charge the average household rates far below PG&E.

His figures, for a 500 kilowatt hour household:

The Chamber attacks public power

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The SF Chamber of Commerce is getting itself all into a frothy lather over the prospect of a public-power campaign, and the email that the Chamber sent out today is full of insanely inaccurate iinformation.

Here’s the email and a few notes on its most bizarre claims:

This Friday, June 27 at 10:00am at City Hall, Room 263 the Rules Committee will consider a measure that would put the City in control of our power system. The cost of this measure will be billions of dollars, paid for with higher utility bills, especially for business.

The cost to buy the PG&E electric system in San Francisco in 2010 is presently expected to beat least $4.02 billion. This is only a preliminary estimate, the final figure could be substantially higher. When you include the interest payments on the bonds and the associated severance and financing costs, the ultimate cost for a takeover will be more than twice that amount.

WHAT? Where do you suppose that $4.02 billion came from? It clearly didn’t come from any realistic study. PG&E’s dilapidated, poorly maintained distribution system is probably worth less than $500 million — and even if the city had to pay twice that much, it would be more than worthwhile when you look at how much revenue would come in.

San Franciscans Will Pay to Replace the Lost Tax Revenue

Taking over PG&E means removing PG&E from the tax rolls. That will cost taxpayers over $25 million annually in lost franchise fees, payroll taxes, property taxes, and direct contributions from PG&E. Those taxes and payments will need to be replaced – or services will need to be cut. The City is now facing one of the most severe budget shortfalls ever. The power system takeover will make this budget gap at least $25 million worse. Again, there is no current plan to replace this lost revenue. The PG&E takeover means either service cuts and layoffs – or another massive tax increase.

HUH? The $25 million the city would lose would be more than replaced by the money — several hundred million at least — that the city would gain in extra revenue from running a municipal utility.

We’ll All Pay the Price of Putting City Hall in Charge of our Power System

Right now, PG&E is regulated by the State of California. But a city-run power system would be exempt from most state regulations, giving the Board of Supervisors the power to make some customers pay more so others can pay less, siphon away funds needed for the retrofit of the Hetch Hetchy water system and delay investments in the safety and reliability of our energy grid.

WELL, actually the supervisors could mandate renewable energy — which PG&E isn’t doing.

So the battle is already underway, and already, PG&E’s mouthpieces are putting out wildly misleading data.

Should be a great hearing tomorrow.

Clean Energy — tomorrow!

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The Board of Supervisors Rules Committee will hold a hearing tomorrow (Friday) to discuss the new clean-energy charter amendment. It’s a long-overdue measure that would give San Francisco control of its own energy future and set aggressive mandates for sifting to renewable resources for electricity.

The measure is sponsored by Supervisors Ross Mirkarimi and Aaron Peskin, and includes the following:

1. A mandate that 51% of the city’s electricity is generated from renewable resources by 2017, 75% by 2030, and 100% by 2040. This would be one of the few laws in the country that requires a city to move toward a 100 percent renewable portfolio. It also requires the Public Utilities Commission to issue a report every two years explaining how the city is meeting those goals. This would be a model for cities around the nation (and around the world), and would put San Francisco in the forefront of the movement to reduce carbon emissions and slow climate change. Since state and federal governments are moving far too slowly on the most important environmental issue of our lives, cities are going to have to take the lead, and San Francisco – one of the most progressive communities in the nation — should be showing everyone else how to do to that.

2. A mandate that the city move toward acquiring its distribution system for the sale of electricity. Pacific Gas and Electric Company, which now supplies the residential and business customers in San Francisco, is spending a huge amount of money on a greenwashing campaign to convince residents that it’s moving away from fossil fuels. That’s a big lie: PG&E’s current power profile is 44 percent fossil fuels, 24 percent nuclear, 20 percent large hydro, and only 12 percent renewable – and the utility admits that it will not even make the state’s mandate of 20 percent renewable by 2010. . The only way this city is going to have a truly environmentally sound energy program is if we run it ourselves.

Of course, a publicly run utility has other big advantages. Public-power agencies all over the country have lower electric rates and many bring in huge amounts of revenue, which the city desperately needs. And public-power is good for the economy

3. Mandate green jobs and job training for San Franciscans. There’s a lot of money in renewable energy, and thousands and thousands of good jobs. The measure mandates that the PUC as part of creating a public power agency create job-training programs to help San Franciscans build careers in green energy.

The hearing is at 10 am. Be there and support this crucial legislation.

Free solar power?

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› sarah@sfbg.com

GREEN CITY San Francisco’s new solar incentive program just might make the conversion to green power almost free to city residents when combined with other state and federal programs, some of which expire at the end of this year.

This is an unlikely city for such a dynamic, as we reported a couple months ago (see "Dark days," 04/16/08), given our small lot sizes, high costs, and the fact that we have about twice as many renters as homeowners. The solar program also hit some political snags.

Promoted since December 2007 by Mayor Gavin Newsom and Assessor/Recorder Phil Ting, the Solar Energy Incentive program has been struggling to get Board of Supervisors approval since January when Sups. Chris Daly, Jake McGoldrick, Ross Mirkarimi, and Aaron Peskin objected to the use of public money to fund the program, which will subsidize solar installations on private homes and businesses.

These San Francisco Public Utilities Commission funds were intended to expand publicly owned power projects such as solar panel installation on city property. But as the SFPUC’s Barbara Hale explained to the Guardian, new laws prevent cities from qualifying for state rebates if they convert municipally owned buildings to solar, making those conversions a comparatively losing financial equation.

So on June 10, the board approved Newsom’s program in an 8-3 vote, with Mirkarimi lending his support after he secured funding for a complementary $1.5 million, one-year solar pilot program targeted at nonprofits and low-income families. The San Francisco Solar Energy Incentive program will provide $3 million in solar rebates annually for 10 years.

As Mirkarimi aide Rick Galbreath told the Guardian, "Nonprofits can’t always move as fast as the private sector, and solar advocates, who have been pushing other programs since December, have already got things in the pipeline."

Some of those other programs combine with the new city one in interesting ways. "What if solar were free? Then everyone would install it, right?" was the question posed by Tom Price, whom we profiled in January (see "Solar man," 01/02/08) for founding Black Rock Solar, which does large public interest solar projects using volunteer labor.

Now Price thinks the free solar power that he’s been able to leverage for schools and hospitals just might be available to the average San Franciscan. "This program inadvertently could make solar in San Francisco the cheapest it’s ever been," Price told us. "At least for a short window of time."

Under the city’s program, solar rebates begin at $3,000 for homeowners — and rise in $1,000 increments to a maximum of $6,000 if residents use local installers, hire city-trained workers, and live in city-designated environmental justice districts. For private businesses, the rebate cap is set at $10,000. But that amount can rise if combined with the state and federal incentives that expire at the end of the year.

"I’m one of three tenants. Each of us has an electrical meter, each of us is eligible for a $5,000 rebate under the city’s program," said Price, who rents on Potrero Hill and hopes to pull off an almost no-cost conversion with his landlord.

Price estimates the solar conversation will cost about $15,000 per tenant. So, if two conversions are done (there’s only space for two conversions on most of the city’s Edwardian and Victorian homes), Price’s landlord can subtract two $5,000 cash rebates, plus the Pacific Gas and Electric Co.–administered California solar incentive, plus a $2,000 federal tax credit.

Price said landlords can also take advantage of a 30 percent investment tax credit on top of a 60 percent tax deduction that Dave Llorens of Next Energy found buried deep within the economic stimulus package signed by President George W. Bush earlier this year. Landlords can then arrange to sell cheap, renewable power to their tenants.

"What if I sign an agreement with my landlord to pay $50 per month for the right to have access to his solar system?" Price said. "So now the money that would have been going to PG&E goes to the landlord."

And it’s clean, free power, rather than PG&E’s expensive power generated largely from nuclear and fossil fuel sources.

"This makes San Francisco the first place a tenant and a landlord can really work together to make solar power affordable," Price said. "And that in turn will help drive adoption of renewable energy."

PG&E lobbying doubletime

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Picture 1.png
image courtesy of www.opensecrets.org

PG&E spent almost $2 million on lobbying during the first quarter of 2008, according to an Associated Press report today. Last year they spent just under $4 million, which means they’re pacing to spend double that this year.

As the industry tally for electric utilities on OpenSecrets.org shows, PG&E is third in the national field – outranked by Southern Company and the Edison Electric Institute (basically a gigantic energy lobbying group of which PG&E is also a member.)

Of course, that’s just taking care of national business. Closer to home, the $13 billion utility company has dropped $208,357.08 this year on lobbying – mostly wining and dining California Public Utilities Commissioners, influencing election outcomes, and paying the salaries of their employees who sit on public boards like the Bay Conservation and Development Commission.

And just an FYI for y’all — the spike in PG&E lobbying in 2006, as shown in the above graph, can be traced to the $11 million the corporation spent defeating a public power campaign in Yolo County. As a public power initiative for San Francisco heads to the November 2008 ballot, can we expect another banner year of spending from PG&E?

Three, Two, One, Boom!

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It’s too brilliant a day to be inside working. You feel like blowing up something up. But don’t want to go postal.
So, live vicariously and watch yesterday’s implosion of half of the boiler building at the former PG&E power plant in Hunters Point, brought to us courtesy of Kristine Enea. Boom!

A vote for public power in November

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EDITORIAL Working with environmentalist cover, Mayor Gavin Newsom and Pacific Gas and Electric Co. have moved aggressively to derail a move that would have given the city control over some local power generation. Instead, the mayor is now pushing to keep Mirant Corp. running the one electricity plant that still operates within city limits.

The politics of the deal are complicated, but the driving force is clear: PG&E didn’t want the city moving even a small step toward public power, and as usual, the big utility is getting its way.

The power plant deal proves exactly why Supervisors Ross Mirkarimi and Aaron Peskin should move forward with a November charter amendment for public power.

As Amanda Witherell reports, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission has been trying for years now to win approval for three city-owned combustion turbines that would generate electric power at a plant at the foot of Potrero Hill. The idea: the turbines, also known as "peakers," would generate enough power during peak-use periods to convince the state to shut down the dirtier Mirant Plant.

Many environmentalists opposed the proposal, saying that the city shouldn’t be building any new fossil-fuel plants. That’s a legitimate argument. But California’s Independent System Operator (Cal-ISO), the agency that controls the electric grid, insisted that renewable energy alone wouldn’t provide enough reliable power for San Francisco, and said the only way to shut down Mirant was to put in the peakers.

PG&E has been trying for months to derail the peakers — not, of course, out of any concern for the environment, but because the city would own the power plants. At first Newsom stuck by his PUC — but after seven PG&E lobbyists came into his office and gave him the facts of life (see "PG&E offers Newsom a blank check" at sfbg.com), he backed down. And now, after meeting with the CEOs of PG&E and Mirant, Newsom is pushing the worst possible alternative: he wants to retrofit the Mirant plant and let the private company operate its own peakers.

Same fossil fuel plants in the Bayview. Same type of air pollution. And the facility would be owned by a private company.

The supervisors need to reject this proposal with extreme prejudice — and the environmentalists who fought the city peakers ought to be just as loud in their opposition to Mirant’s retrofit.

The good news is that this ridiculous Newsom–PG&E deal ought to put the focus at City Hall back on public power, because that’s the only way to create a really green power profile in San Francisco.

Matthew Wald, who has coved energy policy for decades, wrote an interesting piece in the New York Times June 8 discussing why no private company wants to invest money in technology that would reduce carbon emissions from power plants. "Cutting carbon dioxide emissions is a fine idea, and a lot of companies would be proud to do it," Wald wrote. "But they would prefer to be second, if not third or fourth."

That’s because no private utility wants to take the risks and try something new that another company could then copy. In economic terms, carbon reduction is a public good — it’s something that benefits everyone, and nobody has the exclusive right to make money off of it. Private companies have been notoriously bad at investing in public goods.

But that’s not how public power agencies work. A San Francisco power agency would have every motivation to develop and use technology that saves consumers money or protects the environment. There’s no issue of profits to protect; in fact, one of the mandates of a city agency should be reducing carbon emissions and promoting renewable energy.

We have always been sympathetic to the concerns that the city-owned peakers would emit greenhouse gases. But if the city owned the plants, the city could shut them down anytime, whenever enough renewables were available. Mirant won’t shut down anything that is bringing in cash.

Mirkarimi and Peskin are working on the details of a public power measure, but the outlines ought to be clear: it should mandate that the SFPUC create and implement a plan to put the city in the retail power business, in compliance with the letter and spirit of the Raker Act — and get rid of PG&E and Mirant. The supervisors should put that on the November ballot.

Stunning doublespeak on electricity rates

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While PG&E is requesting the California Public Utilities Commission allow them a 6.5 percent electricity rate hike over the next six months, ostensibly to cover skyrocketing natural gas prices, they’re telling local citizens they’re expecting prices to drop.

In Marin County, our neighbors to the north have been listening to PG&E lobbyists criticize their county’s plan to provide 100 percent renewable energy to residents through Community Choice Aggregation. Their CCA plan, called Marin Clean Energy, will offer customers 25 percent renewable energy by 2009 twice what PG&E offers, and for the same rate. Customers who want to pay a little more can go 100 percent renewable right out of the gate. Ultimately, they’ll scale the 25 up to 51 percent by 2013, and 100 percent thereafter.

Marin argues that 100 percent renewable energy is a more fiscally responsible way to go – precisely because natural gas prices are volatile and will continue to rise. But PG&E says Marin’s plan is too risky and too costly. You can read PG&E’s critique of the plan, and Marin’s apt rebuttal, here.

But recent testimony from Dawn Weisz, MCE’s planner, sums it up pretty succinctly.

“Their [PG&E’s] main criticism is that we won’t be able to achieve the cost benefits,” Weisz told a May 23, 2008 meeting of San Francisco’s Local Agency Formation Commission, who had invited her to brief them on their CCA’s progress. Weisz said they had an independent third party analyze the CCA plan and PG&E’s critique.

The analyst found a key flaw in PG&E’s logic. “They’re using a gas forecast that assumes gas will be 14 percent cheaper in 12 years,” Weisz said.

At this, the entire LAFCO board broke out in laughter. Any sane person knows that isn’t going to happen. As Weisz pointed out, natural gas prices rose an average of 30 percent over the last five years, and as the San Francisco Chronicle reported today, they’re 63 percent higher than they were a year ago. Natural gas is a fossil fuel just like crude oil, and speculators are having their day with it, too.

But PG&E is using their estimate to contend their prices will be cheaper than MCE’s over the long run, so you best not switch services. And as we can see from the awkwardly placed chart to the left, PG&E”s rates have only and ever gone up.

As PG&E continues to cling to their fossil fuel infrastructure, and combats communities who attempt to prove viable, renewable alternatives are possible, we should expect to see PG&E pleading at the CPUC for more and more rate hikes.

The public power initiative: let’s roll

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By Bruce B. Brugmann

Coming home after almost two weeks in Sweden with the annual World Association of Newspapers (WAN) assembly and study tour, I was struck once again how nothing seems to change in San Francisco when it comes to the PG&E/Raker Act scandal.

PG&E was still firmly in control of the city’s energy policy in the mayor’s office. Mayor Gavin “The Green Knight” Newsom had capitulated spectacularly to PG&E and had reversed his policy of supporting a plan by his PUC that would have given the city control over some local power generation at the Mirant power plant (the peaker proposal.) The mayor had met secretly with PG&E executives and stiffed representatives from the Potrero Hill neighborhood and the environmental, environmental justice, public power, and community choice aggregation (CCA) movements.

The Hearst-owned Chronicle continued its long corporate tradition of blacking out the real story of the accelerating PG&E/Raker Act scandal. The utility was beautifully executing its divide and conquer strategy it has honed ever since the days that John Muir and the Sierra Club fought in vain to stop the damming of Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park for the city’s public water and power supply. (In that battle at that time, the Guardian would have stood with Muir.)

Amanda Witherell laid out the latest sorry episode in her story in Wednesday’s Guardian. Her lead: “Green City Mayor Gavin Newsom finally outlined what he calls a ‘more promising way forward than the current proposal’ of building two publicly owned power plants in San Francisco. The way forward: retrofit three existing diesel turbines at the Mirant Potrero Power Plant, while simultaneously shutting down Mirant’s most polluting smokestack, Unit 2.”

Our editorial laid out the political context: “The politics of the deal are complicated, but the driving force is clear: PG&E didn’t want the city moving even a small step toward public power, and as usual, the big utility is getting its way…PG&E has been trying for months to derail the peakers–not, of course, out of any concern for the environment, but because the city would own the power plants. At first Newsom stuck by his SPUC but when seven PG&E lobbyists came into his office and gave him the facts of life (see ‘PG&E offers Newsom a blank check‘), he backed down.

“And now, after meeting with the CEOs of PG&E and Mirant, Newsom is pushing the worst possible alternative: he wants to retrofit the Mirant plant and let the private company operate its own peakers. Same fossil fuel plants in the Bayview. Same type of air pollution. And the facility would be owned by a private company.”

Repeating for emphasis: When PG&E spits, City Hall swims. When PG&E spits, the mayor swims.

And so PG&E and Newsom have set the stage for the next phase in this great battle to kick PG&E out of City Hall, enforce the federal Raker Act mandating public power for San Francisco, and bring our own cheap, clean Hetch Hetchy public power to the residents and businesses of San Francisco.

The next stage is the emerging new public power initiative that Supervisors Ross Mirkarimi and Aaron Peskin are working on, with a wide swath of neighborhood and public power forces, aimed for the November ballot as a charter amendment.

This would be the third go at taking on PG&E head-on on the November ballot. This time it has a good chance of succeeding since PG&E and Newsom have gone out of their way to make the case for public power in 96 point Tempo Bold for all to see and savor. The measure will also be helped by massive turnout with Obama, seven supervisorial races, a clutch of solid progressive measures, and a smart, aggressive Obama like grassroots organizing campaign.

Let’s roll. B3, who wonders when he will no longer see the fumes from the Mirant plant from his office window at 135 Mississippi Street at the bottom of Potrero Hill

Click here to read this week’s article, Newsom’s power play.

Click here for this week’s editorial, A vote for public power in November.

Newsom’s power play

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› amanda@sfbg.com

GREEN CITY Mayor Gavin Newsom finally outlined what he calls a "more promising way forward than the current proposal" of building two publicly owned power plants in San Francisco.

The way forward: retrofit three existing diesel turbines at the Mirant-Potrero Power Plant, while simultaneously shutting down Mirant’s most polluting smokestack, Unit 3.

Newsom wrote a letter to the Board of Supervisors just before a June 3 hearing on the power plants, describing a May 23 meeting that he convened with SFPUC General Manager Ed Harrington, City Attorney Dennis Herrera, California Independent System Operator President Yakout Mansour, California Public Utilities Commission Chair Mike Peevey, Mirant CEO Ed Muller, and Pacific Gas & Electric Co. CEO Bill Morrow.

"In the meeting, we vetted the possibility of retrofitting the diesel turbines [currently owned and operated by Mirant] and asked each stakeholder to give us the necessary commitments to advance this alternative," Newsom wrote. The board then voted to shelve the power plant plan until July 15 so the retrofit option can be vetted.

Most significant, Newsom’s meeting with top dogs at energy companies, who stand to lose a lot from San Francisco owning its own power source — and the resulting correspondence — elicited a new response from Cal-ISO, the state’s power grid operator, about exactly how much electricity generation San Francisco needs.

For the first time, Cal-ISO said it will allow Mirant’s Unit 3 to close as early as 2010, when the 400-MW Transbay Cable comes online, saying that the city no longer needs to install a combustion turbine peaker plant at the airport.

Sup. Sophie Maxwell expressed frustration that the questions she, her staff, and other stakeholders have been asking for the past several years are suddenly getting different answers. "I think we’re seeing a big movement by Cal-ISO. This is huge. Before, we asked all these questions, [but] they weren’t saying what they’re saying now," she told the Guardian after the hearing.

When asked why she thought this was happening now, she simply pointed to PG&E. "Who stands to benefit from us not generating our own power? Who sent out all that stuff?" she asked, referring to the flyers depicting filthy power plants that PG&E has been mailing to residents in an effort to drum up public sentiment against the city’s plan to build peakers. "Have they been concerned about what’s clean, about our people?"

Some environmental activists are hailing the change as a triumph. "David has just moved Goliath, but we need to keep pushing," said Josh Arce of Brightline Defense, which sued to stop the city’s plan to build the two power plants. He said his organization’s goal is ultimately to have no fossil fuel plants in the city. But when asked about the retrofit alternative, he said, "We don’t support it; we don’t not support it."

Cal-ISO has insisted that San Francisco needs 150 MW of electricity to stave off blackouts. This grid reliability is currently provided by Mirant-Potrero, but the plant’s Unit 3 is the greatest stationary source of pollution in the city. Bayview residents, who have borne a disproportionate share of the city’s industrial pollution, have been agitating for more than seven years to close the plant. Much of the leadership has come from Maxwell, who represents the district and has championed the plan to replace the older Mirant units with four new ones owned and operated by the city.

That vision was integrated into San Francisco’s 2004 Energy Action Plan, which Cal-ISO has used as a guiding document for the city’s energy future. The plan outlines a way to close Mirant by installing four CTs and 200 MW of replacement power. "Cal-ISO has consistently said in writing, in verbal instructions, and at meetings, that the CTs are the only specific project that was sufficient to remove the RMR [reliability must-run contract] from Mirant," said SFPUC spokesperson Tony Winnicker.

As San Francisco’s energy plans have evolved over recent years, SFPUC staff have been instructed at numerous public hearings in front of the Board of Supervisors to ask Cal-ISO if all four CTs are still necessary. Letters obtained by the Guardian show Cal-ISO has never said the airport CT isn’t necessary until now. When asked why, Cal-ISO spokesperson Stephanie McCorkle said, "The questions are not the same. That’s why the answers are different."

When pushed for more details on what’s different, she said, "We feel the introduction of the Mirant retrofit fundamentally changes our approach to the fourth peaker. I think it’s the megawatts. It’s basically the retrofit that changes the picture."

Mirant’s peakers currently put out 156 MW, an amount that may be reduced by retrofitting. The city’s three peakers would produce 150 MW. Winnicker couldn’t explain why the story is changing, telling us, "We’re really deferring to the leadership of the mayor and the board because they’ve been able to get a really different view from Cal-ISO than we’ve been able to get."

"We’ve always said we’re open to alternatives," McCorkle said. "We can only evaluate what’s presented to us and the Mirant retrofit was only presented in mid-May." Opponents of the peaker plan say the new position indicates SFPUC officials haven’t been pushing Cal-ISO hard enough or asking the right questions.

"The city hasn’t done its due diligence insisting on different configurations of the peakers," Sup. Ross Mirkarimi told us. "What we’re learning now we could have learned two years ago." He went on to add, "With the abundant paper trail, one can only surmise or conclude there may have been a presupposed bias on the part of the PUC to the answers expected from Cal-ISO."

The SFPUC has been instructed by the mayor’s office to determine if Mirant retrofit diesels would be as clean as the city’s CTs. Until that can be proved, some are withholding support.

"I haven’t seen any information that a Mirant retrofit is as clean as the peakers," City Attorney Dennis Herrera told the Guardian. "From my perspective, I want the most environmentally clean solution."

To that end, some would like to see a formal presentation to Cal-ISO of a "transmission-only" alternative, which would outline a number of line upgrades and efficiencies that would obviate the need for any in-city power plants. Sup. Maxwell introduced a resolution urging the SFPUC to put such a proposal before Cal-ISO and to enact strict criteria for any alternative to the city’s CTs.

"We need to remember that Mirant was a bad actor. Mirant is not to be trusted," Maxwell said. "We sued them and we won our suit," she added, citing litigation brought by the city against the private company for operating the power plants in excess of its permitted hours and for market manipulation during the 2001-02 energy crisis.

Maxwell’s legislation, cosigned by six other supervisors, lays those concerns out and cautions, "In view of this history, the city should be cautious and vigilant in taking any steps that expand the operation of Mirant’s facilities in San Francisco."

The legislation also reminds policymakers that San Francisco’s Electricity Resource Plan identifies eight specific goals — one of which is to "increase local control over energy resources." It goes on to say, "City ownership of electric generating supplies can reduce the risk of market power abuses and enable the city to mandate the use of cleaner fuels when feasible or to close down any such generation when it is no longer needed."

Maxwell’s resolution also outlines a series of conditions that any alternative to the city’s peakers would have to meet. The alternative would have to be as clean or cleaner than the city peakers, have the same comprehensive community benefits package that was attached to the city’s peaker plan, have no impact on the bay’s water, and only be run for reliability needs.

The City Attorney’s Office said these criteria are not set in stone — it’s a resolution and therefore requires some level of enforcement or action. Mirkarimi, who signed on to the resolution, is still uncomfortable with it as it stands, saying it should include discussion of the city’s new community choice aggregation (CCA) plan for creating renewable public power projects.

Some environmentalists cautioned that the transmission-only approach still leaves too much control in the hands of others. "We shouldn’t let PG&E be the ones to solve this problem," said Eric Brooks, a Green Party rep and founder of Community Choice Energy Alliance. He’s urging city officials to put all the city’s energy intentions — from the CCA plan for 51 percent renewables by 2017 to an exploration of city-funded transmission upgrades — into a presentation for Cal-ISO.

Brooks noted a conspicuous absence from the May 23 meeting with the mayor: "CCA and environmentalists weren’t at the table, as usual."

Leno celebrates tough win

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Lime on Market Street near Castro was crowded with Mark Leno supporters when the candidate took the microphone just before midnight. He had already taken the concession calls from Carole Migden and Joe Nation and was primed to celebrate his victory over an incumbent senator, whom Leno supporter Bevan Dufty had just taken a couple subtle digs at as he introduced Leno, suggesting that Migden didn’t listen to her constituents or play by the rules.
Leno then gave a speech that demonstrated the unique package of issues, enemies and allies that he has turned into a winning coalition. “Tom Ammiano, it’s gonna be a helluva lot of fun serving with you,” Leno said of the man who will succeed him with his endorsement. “I just heard Prop. E passed,” Leno continued, referencing the measure that will submit the mayor’s SFPUC appointments to Board of Supervisors approval. “As an early supporter, I was happy to see that.” That stand was already a hopeful sign of his independence from Mayor Gavin Newsom and PG&E, but then he really went after the company, which had funded a hit piece mailer by a group calling itself Californians to Protect Children, trotting out some old sleaze about Leno being soft on pedophiles because he resisted right wing efforts to capitalize on crime fears.
“When you attack one gay man like this, you attack all gay men,” Leno said. “All gay men should be outraged with PG&E tonight.” He thanked Dennis Kelly of United Educators of San Francisco for giving his campaign early credibility. Then Leno returned to the LGBT community, promising to heal the rift his challenge of Migden opened by leading the fight against the fall ballot measure that would ban same sex marriage. “I invite you to join together to defeat the religious right,” Leno said.
He then thanked a long list of leaders who endorsed him, from Mayor Gavin Newsom and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to District Attorney Kamala Harris and former SFPUC director Susan Leal to members of the late night entertainment community, which rallied for Leno with signs on nightclubs all over town. And then he thanked his campaign consultants, the downtown darlings BMWL, affectionately naming a list of people from there and saying of the campaign they created: “It was clean, it was smart, it was effective.”
And Leno’s final name check was to the presidential candidate he supports, who also had a good night: “The winds of change are blowing tonight. Let me congratulate Barack Obama on his victory.”

City Hall: Projections at this point

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The early absentees tell us a few things, and Chris Bowman, a GOP consulant who is generally right on his projections, gave us his hit, and here’s how it looks:

Prop. A, the parcel tax for schools, is going to be very close; it’s at 60 percent now and that will be a squeaker.

F and G are over. F lost, G won.

Sandoval may come in first, or at worst a close second, and that race will go to a November runoff.

Prop. E (fuck PG&E) is going to win.

There are some early returns from Marin, and it looks pretty good for Leno — he’s at 31 percent in Marin, with Migden at a low 22.4 and Nation just at 45. So it’s early, but the odds of Leno pulling this out are getting better.

City Hall: Absentee results

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Well, the minute we posted that last entry we got some absentee results — and it looks like Lennar’s money carried the day. Prop. G is winning handily, Prop. F is going down hard.

But there’s fascinating news: Prop. E, the PUC reform measure that PG&E spent a fortune trying to kill, is ahead even in the absentees and will probably win.

Gerardo Sandoval is well ahead in the judicial race, but there may still be a runoff.

Leno is beating Migden handily in the city, and Joe Nation is way behind. That’s good news for Leno, who needs a big win in SF to overcome what will probably be a Nation advantage in the north counties.

Cal-ISO totally changes tune on power plants

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Oh my. For all you folks that have been following the controversy around building new power plants in San Francisco, it just got even better.

Mayor Gavin Newsom sent a letter to the Board of Supervisors today outlining a “more promising way forward than the current proposal” to build two natural gas-burning “peaking” power plants in the city.

The way forward: retrofit three existing diesel turbines at the Mirant-Potrero Power Plant, while at the same time shutting down Unit 3, the most polluting part of the power plant, as soon as the Transbay Cable comes online.

“On Friday, May 23, Ed Harrington [General Manager of the SFPUC], City Attorney Dennis Herrera and I met with president of Cal-ISO – Yakout Mansour, the chairman of the CPUC – Mike Peevey, the CEO of Mirant – Ed Muller, the CEO of PG&E – Bill Morrow, and our respective staffs. In this meeting we vetted the possibility of retrofitting the diesel turbines [currently owned and operated by Mirant] and asked each stakeholder to give us the necessary commitments to advance this alternative,” Newsom wrote to the Board.

For anyone who’s been closely following the nuances of this argument, this is a significant change in position from the California Independent System Operator [Cal-ISO], and it should be noted that it took — not just the Mayor sitting down at the table — but top dogs from PG&E and Mirant (who both stand to lose money by the city building its own power plants), as well as the CPUC’s Peevey, who’s never expressed a positive opinion about the true need for more power plants in the city.

Now, suddenly, Cal-ISO is departing significantly from all previously expressed demands that we build power plants.

The background: The state, through Cal-ISO, has for the last several years insisted that San Francisco needs 150 megawatts of peak electricity at the ready. We currently get this from Mirant-Potrero, but Unit 3 of that facility has a bad rep as the greatest single source of pollution in the city. People in the Bayview neighborhood, which have carried more of their fair share of pollution, have been waiting a long time for the plant to close. Stakeholders have been meeting for over seven years, working on ways to close the plant, and much of the leadership on the issue has come from Sup. Sophie Maxwell, who represents the Bayview district.

Cal-ISO has insisted that the only way to close Unit 3 is to build new peakers, which would be owned and operated by the city, run cleaner and more efficiently, and still supply that 150 MW of peak power. Even when the 400 MW Transbay Cable was approved, Cal-ISO insisted San Francisco would still need the peakers.

But in a June 2 letter, Cal-ISO suddenly had a different response for the Mayor.

Lennar spending records sums on Prop. G

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Tonight’s election results will demonstrate how much money matters in local politics, and whether megadeveloper Lennar is able to essentially buy exclusive development rights for southeast San Francisco. That’s because the $3.9 million and counting that Lennar has spent to approve Prop. G and kill Prop. F could be the most expensive local measure campaign in California history, according to former Common Cause of SF head Charles Marsteller.
To confirm that, I called Bob Stern at the Center for Governmental Studies — the guru of California electoral reform — who had a more qualified answer. Campaign finance records show PG&E spent almost $10 million last year to defeat a package of four public power measures in Yolo and Sacramento counties. PG&E also spent more than $3 million to defeat the Prop. D, the 2002 public power measure in San Francisco. And Stern was trying to get final figures for an expensive 2006 ballot fight in Sacramento over a new stadium. Yet he said Lennar is way up there, well beyond anything he’s seen in his native Southern California.
“It is clearly one of the most expensive,” Stern said. “It’s an enormous amount of money for a local race.”

Why is PG&E attacking Leno on education?

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It’s not like schools are their business – at all. But the $13 billion utility company is the big money behind recent television ads depicting Mark Leno as a foe of children and schools.

“San Francisco Assemblyman Mark Leno claims that he’s for better schools,” the ad informs, according to a transcript provided by the California Teacher’s Association. “Yet in 2004, it was Leno who joined Republicans, and with one vote to spare, cut $3.1 billion from California schools.”

Actually, said CTA in a news release, “It distorts Leno’s support for a state budget in 2004 that temporarily reduced some funding for schools. The budget was approved by the Legislature with bipartisan support in that financially difficult year for the state.”

CTA, which represents 90 percent of the state’s educators, endorsed Leno in the District 3 State Senate race, and held a rally today in Mill Valley to affirm their support and criticize PG&E.

“Why is PG&E behind this?” CTA’s Mike Myslinski wondered when we spoke to him. “Leno has a strong education record and parents and teachers are very disturbed by this ad.”

The ad was attributed to a political action committee called “Protect Our Kids,” which late independent expenditure filings [PDF] with the CA Secretary of State show is heavily funded by CALIFORNIANS FOR A CLEAN ENERGY FUTURE, A COALITION OF ENVIRONMENTALISTS, TAXPAYERS, AND PACIFIC GAS AND ELECTRIC COMPANY. [PDF]

Looks like the San Francisco Police Officers Association, as well as a couple of out of state companies, also kicked in to cover the $100,000 in cash that’s been spent on anti-Leno propaganda that has nothing to do with energy – clean or otherwise. But, as CTA points out, “The PG&E-funded ad comes at a time when one of Leno’s opponents in the Senate race, Joe Nation, is being criticized for his huge financial support from business interests. PG&E is a supporter of Nation.”

It wasn’t all that long ago Leno was shaking hands with PG&E over at the LGBT center.

Joe Nation’s friends are bad news II

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More on why Joe Nation’s friends are bad news:

The Mark Leno campaign has done an analysis of the independent expenditure campaigns supporting Nation, and there are some truly nasty bad guys in there. Many of them (for example, our old friends PG&E) gave campoaign cash directly to Nation, then gave more money through the IEs.

Check out the list, taken from a Leno press release:

Civil Justice Association of California (CJAC) $342,544

A group of big oil, insurance, banking, chemical, pharmaceutical companies as well as companies involved in the subprime mortgage meltdown. They were co-sponsors of Proposition 64, which was opposed by consumer and environmental advocates and weakened the general public’s ability to pursue lawsuits over unfair business practices and environmental violations. CJAC works to limit their member’s liability when lawsuits are brought against them from consumers, patients, workers or environmental advocates.

* Joe Nation took $1,000 from Pacific Gas & Electric Co., CJAC member

* Joe Nation took $3,600 from California Apartment Association, CJAC member

* Joe Nation took $1,000 from the CA Hospital Association, CJAC member

* Joe Nation took $3,600 from MEDPAC of the CA Association of Physician Groups, sponsored by the CA Association of Physicians Organizations Los Angeles, CJAC member

* Joe Nation took $3,200 from the San Francisco Apartment Association, California Apartment Association is a CJAC member

* Joe Nation took $7,200 from the California Real Estate Political Action Committee, CJAC member

Cooperative of American Physicians $100,000

A group that provides liability insurance for it’s member physicians and advocates to maintain the liability caps up-held in the Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act (MICRA), which capped their liability in malpractice lawsuits at 1975 levels.

* Joe Nation took $3,600 from Cooperative of American Physicians

Californians Allied for Patient Protection (CAPP) $50,000

A group of corporate hospitals, doctors, insurance companies and others in the medical industry whose priority is to maintain the liability caps up-held in the Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act (MICRA), which capped their liability in malpractice lawsuits at 1975 levels.

* Joe Nation took $3,600 from Californians Allied for Patient Protection

* Joe Nation took $3,600 from MICRA California PAC of NorCal Mutual Insurance Company, member of CAPP

Californians for Jobs and a Strong Economy $3,277

A group of insurance companies, financial-services firms, developers, card clubs and biotechnology companies

I still think it’s a two-person race now, with Carole Migden far behind. And I think the best way to stop Nation is to vote for Leno. But whoever you support, don’t vote for Nation.

Marin goes 100% renewable…with natural gas

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powerplantandwindmills.jpg
photo of PG&E’s Pittsburg power plant (now owned by Mirant) in front of a horizon full of SMUD’s windmills, courtesy Barbara George of Women’s Energy Matters

I’ve been reading through the Marin Clean Energy plan, which is designed to offer customers in 12 potential cities in Marin County the possibility of powering their homes and businesses with 100 percent renewable energy. How can this be, and how can San Francisco do the same?

Their community choice aggregation plan offers folks two options: “light” green (25 percent renewable, ramping up to 50 percent by 2014) or “deep” green (100 percent renewable right out of the gate.) Initially, this will be achieved through power purchase agreements with third-party renewable energy suppliers, while at the same time contracting to build their own renewable power sources and encouraging citizens, through incentives, to put up their own solar panels and wind vanes. (Studies have shown that Marin County has the potential for as much as 846 megawatts of renewables, mostly from solar and wind, though biomass and methane capture are also achievable, especially with all those dairy farms.) The county’s draw is about 240 megawatts.

But my question was if they would still need to rely on natural gas or any other “conventional” power sources as they transition, or to meet peak needs and state-mandated reliability standards.

I queried Tim Rosenfeld, of the Marin Energy Management Team, who has been consulting the county on the plan. “We can’t abandon conventional natural gas generation,” he told me. “It will still be there for firming and shaping our grid, but we will be able to ‘green’ it through our renewable generation.”

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