You're the Mark in a Billion-Dollar Dirty Power Plant Sting

Heists, hustles and scams are familiar movie themes - in part because we can all relate to the consistent barrage of persuasions intended to separate us from our money in exchange for a product or service we may or may not need. Or perhaps you recall the statewide havoc from energy market manipulations.

The energy industry is a master of gamesmanship. Their hustles are so multilayered and shrouded with official veils of respect that the public is usually unaware of the scam or feels powerless to stop it. Confusion tactics and strategies deployed by industry shills are tried and true methods of extracting large sums. Distant spot fires started by grenades and fanned by party loyal zealots obscure and divert attention away from lucrative capers. The game is so effective that the public is taken over and over again.

Our own variation on this type of "Sting" comes centerstage to San Diego on March 21, when the CPUC votes on whether power purchase contracts will be authorized for three expensive un-needed dirty power plants (including Quail Brush that would despoil Mission Trails Park). If approved, estimated costs up to $2 billion will be absorbed by customers like you.

This time however, watchdog activists from multiple organizations have been working to expose the rip-off and the swing of just one vote is likely to determine whether greed or public interest forces will prevail in this skirmish. Your willingness to attend and play a speaking role in this drama could make the difference for your own wallet and health.

The ad lib script has become quite thick. This pressure cooker has resulted in five delays of a Proposed Decision that would deny the scam. A published finding upon evidence that the expensive dirty plants are not needed could have been approved last November. However, the current CPUC president/former utility CEO is the ultimate insider at state energy agencies operating without effective checks and balances and there is seemingly little interest from the governor to hold them accountable for their shenanigans.

CPUC President Michael Peevey has become so confident (some would say arrogant) in his dirty gas-plant agenda, that he ignored state open meeting law in a blatant action that utilized the chair of the CEC to attempt a revolt that would overturn lead commissioner Mark Ferron's favorable proposal. The truth was revealed because the law required release of requested secretive communications between the CPUC and CEC heads.

The fact is, we already have more than double the state's power reserve margin requirement and are able to produce 44% more power then there is demand for. Simply put, we already have an overabundance of the expensive "quick start flexible capacity resources" the colluding energy heads are still promoting.

So whether its a taxpayers group that effectively advocates fleecing of taxpayers - a "cleantech" that supports dirty power - a union that pays members with gift cards to speak at hearings - a watchdog incentivized not to watch - or an editorial page that acts as a corporate shill, these vessels wield significant influence. However, with your help at 9 am on March 21, they will not prevail over "truth, justice and the American way" or the Proposed Decision of Super-Commissioner Mark Ferron.

Van K. Collinsworth
Resource Analyst/Executive Director, Preserve Wild Santee

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