The power grid battle that's dividing California environmentalists

Los Angeles Times

3 days ago

In an early episode of the TV series 'Lost,' the plane crash survivors stranded on a mysterious island are running low on water. A fight breaks out, until emerging leader Jack Shephard admonishes everyone to work together.
'If we can't live together, we're gonna die alone,' he says.
California lawmakers contemplating our climate future ought to take that lesson to heart.
Senate Bill 540 would help establish a regional electricity market capable of tying together the American West's three dozen independent power grids. Supporters say it would smooth the flow of solar and wind power from the sunny, windy landscapes where they're produced most cheaply to the cities where they're most needed. It would help California keep the lights on without fossil fuels, and without driving up utility bills.
That may sound straightforward, but the bill has bitterly divided environmentalists. Welcome to the Wild West of energy policy.
Some consider regional power-trading a crucial market-based tool for accelerating climate progress. Others see it as a plot by greedy energy companies to enrich themselves.
Those divides didn't stop the Senate from unanimously passing SB 540. But amendments demanded by skeptical lawmakers are now threatening to derail the bill in the Assembly — even as Gov. Gavin Newsom threw his weight behind the concept Wednesday.
Critics warn that SB 540 would result in California yielding control of its power grid to out-of-state officials and the Trump administration, who could force Californians to pay for coal-fired electricity from Utah and Wyoming. They also worry about market manipulation driving up electric rates.
Those fears are understandable. I also think they're misguided.
California by itself can't stop the planet from heating up. The Golden State's decades-long campaign to slow the wildfires, floods and heat waves of the climate crisis has been predicated on the conviction that eventually, other states and nations will follow along — even oil bastions and MAGA hothouses.
In other words: If we can't live together, we're gonna die alone.
Fortunately, even in the wake of President Trump's 'Big Beautiful Bill' gutting clean energy incentives, solar and wind power are still cheaper than planet-warming coal and fossil gas. Which is why Michael Wara, a Stanford energy and climate scholar, isn't worried that SB 540 will leave Californians drowning in dirty power. In a regional market, solar and wind will usually outcompete coal and gas.
'Any energy source that requires fuel to operate is more expensive than an energy source that doesn't,' he said.
California also needs to prove that a grid powered entirely by clean energy is affordable and reliable. The state's rising electric rates are already a big concern. And although the grid has been stable the last few years, thanks to batteries that store solar for after dark, keeping the lights on with more and more renewables might get harder.
Regional market advocates make a strong case that interstate cooperation would help.
For instance, a market would help California more smoothly access Pacific Northwest hydropower, already a key energy source during heat waves. It would also give California easier access to low-cost winds from New Mexico and Wyoming. Best of all, that wind is often blowing strong just as the sun sets along the Pacific.
Another benefit: Right now, California often generates more solar than it can use during certain hours of the day, forcing solar farms to shut down — or pay other states to take the extra power. With a regional market, California could sell excess solar to other states, keeping utility bills down.
'This is about lowering costs,' said Robin Everett, deputy director of the Sierra Club's Beyond Coal Campaign.
When I wrote about a past regional market proposal in 2017, the Sierra Club was opposed. It believed a regional market would throw an economic lifeline to Utah and Wyoming coal plants owned by Warren Buffett's PacifiCorp company by giving them access to new markets — including California — to sell their power.
Eight years later, things are different. High costs are driving coal toward extinction. Solar and wind cost even less. Sierra Club staff now say California should be less worried about opening new markets to coal and more worried about averting blackouts or high utility bills that could trigger an anti-renewables backlash.
'Otherwise we're going to see more and more gas, and a push to keep coal online,' Everett said.
But here's where the politics get tricky.
Although the Sierra Club endorsed the Pathways Initiative — the detailed regional market plan on which SB 540 is based — it hasn't endorsed the bill. That's because many of the club's volunteer leaders still hate the idea.
They're not alone.
SB 540's opponents include the Center for Biological Diversity, Food and Water Watch and Consumer Watchdog. (Full disclosure: My father-in-law, an energy lawyer, has advocated against the bill.) Eight chapters of 350.org and 73 chapters of progressive group Indivisible stand opposed. So does the Environmental Working Group.
On the flip side, supporters include Climate Hawks Vote, the Environmental Defense Fund, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Nature Conservancy, the Union of Concerned Scientists and two chapters of 350.org.
Loretta Lynch, who led the state's Public Utilities Commission during the early-2000s energy crisis, thinks SB 540 would open the door for more market manipulation, giving energy companies legally sanctioned tools to thwart climate goals and force Californians to pay for expensive fossil fuels.
Her warnings have resonated with activists frustrated by California's investor-owned utilities, which keep raising electric rates and recently helped persuade officials to slash rooftop solar incentives. Indeed, SB 540's supporters include Southern California Edison, Pacific Gas & Electric and trade groups for major power producers.
'They want no guardrails or limits on how they can fleece California,' Lynch said.
It's a compelling narrative. But most energy experts who have studied the bill aren't convinced.
For one thing, electricity sales have changed dramatically since the energy crisis, with more oversight and fewer last-minute trades limiting the potential for shenanigans. Unlike with past regional market proposals, California would retain control of its grid operator, with only a few functions delegated to a regional entity. And California's grid is already subject to federal regulation, meaning Trump could try undermining state policy at any time.
Labor attorney Marc Joseph, who helped lead the charge against previous regional market bills, described Lynch's talking points as 'good arguments against a thing that is no longer being proposed.'
'We're in a different place because it's a fundamentally different thing,' Joseph said.
Joseph represents the politically powerful International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. After years of fighting regional markets, IBEW is now a vocal supporter. What changed, Joseph said, is that SB 540 would safeguard state climate goals, thus making it a valuable tool to advance solar and wind farms — and create good-paying jobs.
Even with IBEW's support, though, it's not clear if SB 540 will reach Newsom's desk.
To secure support in the Senate in May, Sen. Josh Becker (D-Menlo Park), the bill's author, added amendments to assuage concerns about California giving up too much control of its grid. Ironically, many of the bill's key backers now say they're opposed unless the amendments are removed or tweaked.
Why would they say that? Because California is the biggest electricity user in the West, and other states won't join a regional market unless they're confident California will participate — and the amendments would make it easier for the Golden State to bail. Out-of-state utilities don't want to waste time and money committing themselves to a California-led market only to lose California, and thus many of the economic benefits.
That's especially true because those utilities have another option. Arkansas-based Southwest Power Pool, which operates the electric grid across much of the central U.S., is recruiting Western utilities to its own regional market. Already, utilities based in Arizona, Colorado and the Pacific Northwest have agreed to join.
Arkansas isn't leading the West to a clean energy future. California can try — or it can close itself off to the world.
Living together is no guarantee. But dying alone is definitely worse.
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