CPUC Decision Demonstrates AES Redondo Is Not Necessary

The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) issued a draft decision on Dec. 21 directing Southern California Edison to issue long term natural gas power plant power procurement contracts for a minimum of 1,000MW and a maximum of 1,200 MW in the Western LA Basin (our part of the grid). This draft decision was made to support replacement of ocean water cooled power plants in the Los Angeles Basin. 

Ocean-cooled power plants at Alamitos, El Segundo, Huntington Beach, and Redondo Beach have provided over 4,900MW of generation capacity.   New State law requires these plants to significantly reduce their use of ocean water cooling.  Each plant has an assigned compliance date.  AES Redondo must comply by December 31st, 2020.  Power companies are pushing the CPUC to issue new long term contracts so they can commit to building new generation capacity to replace the ocean water cooled plant capacity that is needed.

In this decision, the CPUC is stating that the most replacement power they foresee needing from natural gas plants in the Western LA Basin is 1,200MW.  The El Segundo plant is already being rebuilt at 630 MW.  AES has applied to rebuild 939 MW at Huntington Beach. And AES has indicated they intend to rebuild Alamitos at its full 1,900MW capacity. These three plants would far exceed the 1,500 MW maximum set by the CPUC. This determination corroborates other state agency projections and corroborates BBR and independent consultant conclusions that power from AES Redondo is not required for future grid reliability. 

The California Independent Systems Operator (CAISO), who is responsible for grid reliability, projects that 2,400 MW of replacement generation capacity is required.  This is still far below the 3,400+ MW of capacity if El Segundo, Huntington, and Alamitos are rebuilt at the capacities cited above. AES agreed with the CAISO recommendations stating they calculate 2,300MW of replacement power required.  The CPUC agrees as well and assigns this need to renewable energy projects, energy efficiencies and demand response, other distributed generation and finally, between 1,100 and 1200 MW of natural gas power generation.

Of note is that CAISO, AES and CPUC all agree that the power generation requirement goes up if the replacement plants are not at an “effective” location on the grid, though they differ on the exact definition of “effective”. Previous ISO and CPUC documents have deemed El Segundo, Alamitos and Huntington as critical locations. AES Redondo is never mentioned as it is not located where it can address the most likely generation and transmission failures. This data shows that not only is power from Redondo Beach not required, it actually is undesirable because it would drive up the need for more natural gas power due to its poor location on the grid.

Yet another state agency document confirms what we’ve stated all along. We do not need power from this site. Since we don’t need the power, we should not have to suffer the negative health, environmental, economic impacts of this eyesore blighting our waterfront. 

Measure A gets rid of our unneeded power plant and its impacts on our community. Vote Yes on Measure A.

For more info, go to http://aesredondomustgo.blog.com/