Photo: FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP / Getty Images
Between August 31 and September 9, 2022, California residents experienced one of the most extreme and prolonged heat waves in the state’s history. As a result, electricity demand hit a record 52,061 megawatts, compared to between 42,000 and 50,000 megawatts in which it fluctuates during the summer months.
The state came perilously close to a power deficit that would require phased supply cuts, which ultimately did not happen.
Fearing about the reliability of the electric grid, Governor Gavin Newsom suspended environmental controls, specifically air pollution restrictions for gas and diesel plants (called BUGs) to allow more electricity generation.
In the emergency, he gave the green light for more pollution in poor communities and communities of color, especially in Southern California.
The message of the state government’s response was to keep California’s lights on and air conditioners running, gas plants — numbering nearly 200 according to a 2018 Union of Concerned Scientists study — must keep operating.
A coalition of environmental groups interested in replacing gas plants with clean energy generators decided to study the critical event to debunk that message.
The group is led by the environmental initiative Regenerate California, (created by CEJA and the Sierra Club) together with the California Environmental Justice Alliance (CEJA); the Sierra Club, the California Coastal Alliance United for a Sustainable Economy (CAUSE); Communities for a Better Environment (CBE) and the Center for Community Action and Environmental Justice (CCAEJ).
The study carried out by Grid Strategic, which included 107 gas plants in California, compared the performance of gas plants in the emergency period with the emissions generated and revealed that these had risen, especially in poor communities and communities of color , by 60%.
The results of the report revealed, as the text of the report states, that “we still depend on expensive and polluting fossil fuel infrastructure that exacerbates climate change and disproportionately pollutes low-income communities and communities of color.”
Last June, Newsom signed AB 205, which facilitates the development of non-fossil energy sources. But it also establishes, in the name of ensuring adequate power supplies, a Strategic Reliability Reserve, which allows and funds power sources of all kinds that do not require certification by CEQA, the California Environmental Quality Act.
The authors of the study oppose this part of the law because it creates a kind of back door whereby “investments in the same fossil fuel resources that include gas plants and diesel backup generation” are doubled.
Consequently, instead of accelerating its closure, the construction of projects that, according to the study, use gas to generate electricity in the cities of
in Lodi, Modesto and Turlock that are exempt from the normal regulatory review process
These are the surface water treatment facility site in Lodi, the Claribel Substation site in the Modesto Irrigation District, and the Marshall Substation site in the Turlock Irrigation District.
During the heat wave, the study claims, many of the gas plants failed to operate at the capacity their advocates had hoped.
And in terms of toxic emissions, according to the Continuous Emissions Monitoring Analyzer (CEMS) of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the California gas plants studied emitted in that period the equivalent of the pollution produced by 43,000 vehicles in a year.
Contamination spikes were concentrated in highly populated regions, and specifically in low-income, “disadvantaged,” environmental justice communities where more Latinos or African-Americans live.
These communities already face air quality problems that seriously affect their health, which is why the study considers what was done as “an unfair and inappropriate solution to comply with the reliability of the network.”
What to do now? Instead of continuing to invest in more polluting plants, the document proposes accelerating the transition to clean energy so that by 2030 it will be able to meet maximum demand. To this end, it proposes that future investments in gas plants be allocated to clean energy resources. It also suggests paying residents to reduce their demand for electricity during key periods and investing in solar power sources, energy storage batteries, geothermal and wind power.
In conclusion, the increase in the use of polluting energy due to global warming caused by that same use does not make common sense. It does have to accelerate its removal as a source of contamination and replace it with healthy alternatives.