An S.F. energy policy (MUD)
 	 		 		 		
An S.F. energy policy | May 16, 2001 | SFBG News
 						
SUP. SOPHIE Maxwell has asked for a hearing before the full Board 
of Supervisors next Monday to discuss the city's policy for 
adding new electricity generation to one of the two power plants 
in the southeast corner of the city, which she represents. It's a 
tricky situation: With the likelihood that rolling blackouts will 
be an everyday event this summer, the supervisors will be under 
immense pressure, particularly from other parts of the city, to 
support increased generating capacity at the plants. 
Environmentalists argue, however, that the two 
oil-and-natural-gas-fired plants already create serious 
air-pollution (and health) problems in Bayview-Hunters Point and 
Potrero Hill (see "Toxic Solution") and that they ought to be 
shut down.
 						
Maxwell's proposal is somewhere in between. For starters, she's 
asking for the city to craft a long-term energy policy that's 
based on renewable energy – something San Francisco should have 
had years ago. She suggests that the Potrero plant be allowed to 
expand by as much as 540 megawatts, a substantial increase that 
would provide more than half of the city's total energy needs, on 
the condition that it lead to the shutdown of the aging Hunters 
Point plant (a notorious polluter), the shutdown of the filthy 
oil-fired "peaker plants" at Potrero, and a net reduction in 
total air pollutants in the region.
 						
That's a reasonable position. A new generating facility on the 
Potrero site would almost certainly be cleaner than the current 
plant. The additional generating capacity would go a long way 
toward reducing the city's reliance on importing power through a 
single Peninsula trunk line that's proven unreliable. And if the 
municipal utility district initiative passes in November, and San 
Francisco sets up a public power system and takes over the local 
power plants by eminent domain, the new generating capacity could 
help the MUD provide reliable energy to local customers without 
buying expensive power on the open market.
 						
Still, there are serious environmental issues involved in 
building and operating even a modern, state-of-the-art power 
plant. Among other things, the site itself is contaminated, and 
construction would probably involve excavating some very toxic 
soil (and the plant's owner, Mirant Corporation, should be 
required to pay for a full site cleanup). Even the newest 
generation of gas-burning plants emits some degree of hazardous 
material. And the Potrero-Dogpatch-Bayview-Hunters Point area has 
always taken the brunt of these sorts of polluting projects – 
nobody would even consider building a new power plant in Noe 
Valley, or the Marina, or Pacific Heights.
 						
On a global level, of course, any increased use of fossil fuels 
for energy production is a problem, and San Francisco ought to be 
at the forefront of the movement to end reliance on nonrenewable 
resources for electric power.
 						
Maxwell has done a public service by calling for a hearing and 
raising the key issue: why doesn't San Francisco have any sort of 
long-term energy plan? Before the supervisors agree to support, 
even in principle, any new fossil-fuel plants, they should 
commission a full and detailed study on what the city's immediate 
and future energy needs are and how they can best be met.
 						
Is it possible that aggressive conservation, an extensive program 
of solar, wind, and possibly biomass generation, combined with 
the full capacity of the Hetch Hetchy hydroelectric project 
(which would involve breaking the contracts that sell off much of 
that power to two Central Valley irrigation districts) could 
ultimately handle the city's entire load – with no fossil-fuel 
plants at all? Is it possible that a much smaller Potrero plant 
project would be adequate? Might it be possible to site a 
gas-fired plant somewhere else (say, at the airport), where the 
impact on a residential neighborhood would be greatly reduced?
 						
The final policy needs to begin and end with the understanding 
that no energy policy will work if the city is forced to rely on 
private companies like Pacific Gas and Electric and Mirant for 
generation and distribution of power and should include strong 
language calling for full public ownership of all power 
facilities in the city. Ultimately, these decisions can only be 
made by an elected public power agency after extensive public 
debate.
 						
It's tempting to move quickly on anything that might help the 
city's desperate power situation. But this is an unusual 
opportunity for San Francisco to think about the future – about 
avoiding blackouts not just now but 10 and 20 years from now, 
when the city can and should be a national showcase for 
environmentally sound energy policy.
 						
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