[Sustain] Power Plant Update! & Monday Hearing Alert

[David Fairley]

Eric,

Thanks for the excellent summary and keeping us up to date.  There is one  
other powerful argument against investing in any new fossil fuel  
generation, namely, the additional need to reduce greehouse gas  
emissions.  Building new peakers would add literally millions of dollars  
annually to the amount that the City (or someone) has to pay to meet our  
greenhouse gas reduction goals.

The City is committed to reducing greehouse gases.  But building these  
plants is the greenhouse equivalent of putting 30,000 new SUVs on the  
road.  The current cost of carbon offsets -- the market rate for  
offsetting greenhouse gases -- is $12 to $15 per ton.  It's not  
unreasonable to assume that this is what the City (or someone) has to pay,  
then the plants, operated at the maximum allowable rate, would require $4  
million in offsets every year.  Eric, you must know the figures, but this  
would certainly add years to the time it takes to pay off the plants, and  
perhaps even make it impossible.

The powers that be are right, for once, in their commitment to doing  
something about global warming.  We should make it clear to them how that  
commitment changes the equation.

David

On Sat, 07 Jun 2008 19:05:31 -0700, Eric Brooks <brookse32 at aim.com> wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> We are, at last, very close to stopping the proposed combustion turbine
> 'peaker' plant project, afterwhich we will then be able to re-direct our
> full attention to attack the Mirant plant head on and shut it down as
> quickly as possible.
>
> We could be a mere 2 years away from ending fossil fuel power plant
> generation in San Francisco.
>
> As you know, because of our coalition's relentless pressure on the
> SFPUC, Cal ISO, Board of Supervisors, and Mayor, the Cal ISO has at last
> been forced into the position of making clear what it has been
> cryptically hinting at for nearly a decade - that -no- new fossil fuel
> power plants are needed to shut down the Mirant Potrero power plant. The
> Cal ISO has said that when the Transbay Cable comes online in 2010 it
> will remove the main gas boiler at Mirant (which generates 97% of
> Mirant's electricity) from must run status. The Cal ISO has said that
> the remaining three diesel turbines at Mirant can be gradually upgraded
> to run on natural gas if they are needed for emergency reliability, and
> we know from previous Cal ISO staff statements, that Cal ISO may even
> consider one, two or even all of those older turbines unnecessary for
> electricity reliability once the Transbay Cable is installed.
>
> So, what was a couple of weeks ago, a debate between putting in a new
> polluting natural gas plant which would have to run 18-30 years to pay
> itself off, or instead supposedly being stuck with a Mirant plant that
> would still have to continue running every day; has now become a
> completely different question.
>
> The new Cal ISO letter makes clear that the SFPUC staff's claims of the
> second scenario were a complete deception; and so now we have a brand
> new question:
>
> Can the City build enough solar, wind, and efficiency projects to make
> even upgraded Mirant diesel turbines completely unnecessary upon, or
> shortly following, the installation of the Transbay Cable in 2010?
>
> Clearly, that is a much better question to debate.
>
> I recommend that we -not- support the plan to upgrade the Mirant diesel
> turbines, but just so we can get a sense of the foundation of this new
> debate, here's the breakdown of why, even if we got stuck with such a
> Mirant upgrade plan, it would still be far better than the previous
> Combustion Turbine (CTs) proposal.
>
> 1) The cost of upgrading the Mirant diesels to run on natural gas would
> be $60 million. (The cost of installing the CTs would have been at least
> $273 million and probably would have gone much higher.)
>
> 2) According to a new study by the Bay Area Air Quality Management
> District, the upgraded Mirant diesels would actually pollute -less- than
> the CTs!
>
> 3) To pay off its massive cost, the CT project would have to run for
> 18-30 years. Because of recently spiking natural gas prices, and recent
> state government limits on fossil fuel power purchasing and sales, the
> City would likely have faced a crisis in its ability to pay off the CTs,
> and might have been forced to run them more often, and for more than 30
> years, to pay for them. This latter reality would have meant that the
> CTs would have polluted -much- more than upgraded Mirant natural gas
> peakers.
>
> 4) If the Mirant diesel turbines are upgraded, this will be done
> gradually, one turbine at a time. So if, by the time the first turbine
> was upgraded, the Transbay Cable was online, and sufficient solar, wind
> and efficiency were installed; the Cal ISO might very well decide that
> only the one upgraded turbine (or possibly even no turbines) was
> necessary; and that the other two turbines could then simply be shut
> down immediately saving tens of millions of dollars, and setting a solid
> precedent for San Francisco to simply build more renewables and
> efficiency and rapidly shut down even that last remaining turbine.
> Clearly in this gradually phased upgrade scenario, it is highly likely
> that within just a few years (most likely when the Community Choice
> renewable energy project has installed its first 360 megawatts of clean
> renewable capacity by around 2012) we would be shutting down -all- of
> the fossil fuel power plants in the City. In other words, no more
> polluting power plants at all within just 4 years!
>
> 5) In the Cal ISO options described for proceeding with the plan to
> upgrade the Mirant diesels, the Cal ISO said that one of those options
> would allow the City to control the operation of those upgraded turbines
> and only require them to be turned on during real electricity demand
> emergencies.
>
> Now, with that potential better scenario established, I would recommend
> that we stay with the strong strategy that has won us such a huge
> change; and that we therefore -continue- challenging the SFPUC and Cal
> ISO and -continue- to insist that -no- fossil fuel generation will be
> necessary once the Transbay Cable is installed, and that the new debate
> should be between either upgrading the Mirant diesels, or instead saving
> ourselves that $60 million upgrade cost, and spending that money to
> aggressively accelerate our installation of solar, wind, and efficiency
> projects as we completely shut down Mirant in 2010! We would be truly
> guiding the world strongly into a zero fossil fuel future.
>
> Next Steps
>
> The Board of Supervisors continued its vote on the ICC CT peaker project
> contract to Tuesday, July 15, and it is likely that on that day they
> will simply table the CT project.
>
> -However- Sophie Maxwell is -still- stubbornly clinging to the CT
> project and has rapidly introduced into committee for this Monday, a new
> resolution (see attached pdf file) which -claims- to start a new search
> for alternatives for shutting down Mirant, but which will instead simply
> deceptively reinforce the same old SFPUC verbal tricks around taking the
> CT project seriously. This would force the Board of Supervisors back
> into yet another 'he said - she said' technical debate between the CT
> project and the possible upgraded Mirant diesels project. If Maxwell
> succeeds in playing her latest game, we will face yet another grueling
> set of hearings comparing the CT project to other options, instead of
> having the much more progressive debate over whether to upgrade the
> Mirant diesels, or simply go all renewables and efficiency by 2012.
>
> Ross Mirkarimi's office will likely introduce some strong amendments to
> the Maxwell resolution that remove all of its game playing and instead
> turn the City to that much better debate between the Mirant diesels and
> an all renewables option; but he will not get a chance to introduce
> those amendments until the Maxwell measure reaches the full Board of
> Supervisors. This is because Maxwell's resolution will be heard in the
> Government Audit and Oversight Committee this Monday morning where she
> and her CT project ally Aaron Peskin will simply pass it on to the full
> Board without real debate, and will probably stonewall any amendments.
>
> So we have yet another golden opportunity to be heard on this issue on
> Monday morning - this time, to tell Sophie Maxwell and Aaron Peskin loud
> and clear that we demand an end to any more useless, time wasting
> debates over the CT project, and to insist that the Supervisors now ask
> the SFPUC to come up with a renewables only energy plan to close Mirant
> down completely in 2010 when the Transbay cable comes online.
>
> Keep in mind that Sophie's item is just a resolution, so don't
> necessarily break your back to show up at the Monday hearing. However,
> it is always good for us to get another chance to speak on this issue,
> and this new hearing now gives us a chance to raise the level of debate
> to a discussion of how to get -rid- of fossil fuel power plants in San
> Francisco and replace them with clean renewable energy by the end of
> this decade! So if you can make it, by all means do. :)
>
> To see the hearing time, location, and details go to
> http://www.sfgov.org/site/bdsupvrs_page.asp?id=82213
> Sophie's resolution is first on the agenda, and entitled 'Closure of the
> Potrero Power Plant'. (Note that although Ross and Chris Daly are listed
> as co-sponsors of the item, they have now been informed of the problems
> with the resolution, and will act to remove the trick language in it.)
>
> peace
>
> Eric Brooks
>



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