CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: FRIDAY, APRIL 26, 2019, OR THEREAFTER
BY THOMAS D. ELIAS
“UTILITY TROUBLES COULD BE A CONSUMER OPPORTUNITY”
FOR RELEASE: FRIDAY, APRIL 26, 2019, OR THEREAFTER
BY THOMAS D. ELIAS
“UTILITY TROUBLES COULD BE A CONSUMER OPPORTUNITY”
Jog
your memory back just nine years to 2010 and you’ll find California’s Big Three
privately-owned electric utilities spending more than $70 million – $46 million
from Pacific Gas & Electric Co. alone – trying to pass a ballot proposition
making it almost impossible to create new publicly-owned utilities.
Imagine
the outcry today if PG&E and its allies at Southern California Edison Co.
and San Diego Gas & Electric Co. spent that kind of money on a measure
designed to keep their monopolies intact.
All
three have been implicated in the ignition of several of the largest wildfires
in California history, causing tens of billions of dollars in damage to their
customers. So the outcry against any repeat of the big-money utility company
effort to pass the 2010 Proposition 16 – it failed – would come not only from consumers,
but also from victims of fires admittedly started by the electric firms’
equipment, who see any utility spending for political donations or lobbying as
essentially theft. It would take money away from the cash reservoir available
to compensate victims.
The
utility company effort of nine years ago aimed to require a two-thirds public
vote before any new Community Choice Aggregations could be started. Such a huge
margin would be virtually unattainable, the utilities knew.
If that
measure had passed, it’s doubtful places as diverse as Marin County and
Manhattan Beach, San Francisco and Simi Valley would have the CCAs now serving
them. These publicly-owned electricity suppliers buy power where they want,
then transmit it back to their customers on power lines owned by the utilities.
The
results include far greater use of renewable energy in California than before,
lower prices in many places, and lower utility company revenues.
It’s that
last item that the big regional power companies fearfully anticipated. Because
they are publicly-owned, CCAs don’t pay or pass through the same taxes as other
utilities. So even if the juice they use costs them a tad more, it ends up
costing most consumers a bit less, besides being better for the environment and
the planet.
What’s
more, the utilities will never be bankrupted by this, as PG&E has declared
it will be by its own negligence in power line maintenance and wildfire
prevention.
The
biggest of the CCAs resulting from Proposition 16’s failure is the Clean Power
Alliance of Ventura and Los Angeles counties, which serves their unincorporated
areas, plus 31 cities. More can join if they wish.
The
first invoices from that brand new CCA went to customers within the last few
weeks. These invoices include power transmission charges from Southern
California Edison, with all the funds collected via Edison’s existing billing
system.
A
typical invoice shows the majority of the money charged still goes to Edison,
even under the CCA’s most expensive option, which uses power drawn exclusively
from renewable sources like solar, wind, geothermal and hydroelectric dams.
But the
debut of the Clean Power Alliance and other CCAs was delayed by onerous rules
set up two years ago by the state Public Utilities Commission, which has long
done what it could to aid the companies it’s supposed to regulate. One rule
passed in 2017 set up new, higher levies on CCA customers as a way to
compensate utilities for their expenses in building power plants – which
customers already fund via their rates.
But
neither the PUC nor the utilities are now now focused on CCAs, obsessed instead
with lawsuits both filed and anticipated in the wake of the massive Camp,
Thomas, Woolsey and other hugely damaging fires of the last two years.
Especially
with a new top management and board of directors coming to the largest of the
utilities, PG&E, this change in their concerns creates an opening for new
CCAs like the one now desired by San Diego and its Republican mayor, Kevin
Faulconer.
It’s
small consolation, especially to burned out homeowners, but this could mean
there will eventually be some long-term consumer benefit after all from
California’s vast firestorms.
-30-
Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough: The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net.
Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough: The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net.
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