Utilities Would Cut Smog by Funneling Gas to Power Plants

In a smog-reduction move, the state’s major utilities have agreed to funnel as much cleaner-burning natural gas as possible into Orange and Los Angeles counties and parts of the surrounding area, thus lessening the need to burn oil to power electric generators.

The plan means that Orange County’s major supplier of electricity, Southern California Edison, will be able to continue using natural gas at its Huntington Beach steam-generating plant and at another steam plant on the San Gabriel River near Seal Beach. Both plants directly affect the county’s air quality.

The plan, announced Monday at a news conference in Los Angeles, could mean higher electric bills for consumers. At the news conference, Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley urged consumers to help themselves by voluntarily reducing energy consumption by at least 10%. A similar conservation effort in the late 1970s was successful, Bradley said.

Agreement on Fuel

Officials of San Diego Gas & Electric, which supplies electricity to 70,000 customers in south Orange County, said they agreed to burn more fuel oil if necessary so that natural gas can be diverted to power plants in the immediate Los Angeles area. Since SDG&E; gas and fuel oil plants are downwind from Orange County, that decision is not expected to affect Orange County’s air quality.

The natural gas plan was reached after a day of meetings involving officials from the Public Utilities Commission, Bradley’s staff and the major utilities. It came a week after Southern California Gas Co. imposed a 20% reduction in supplies to major power utilities, including Southern California Edison Co. and the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power. Orange County officials did not participate in the talks. But Ed Mountford, aide to Supervisor Harriett M. Wieder, said the new natural gas delivery plan will help Orange County’s air quality because “we’re all in the same air basin” and the smog that otherwise would flow here from Los Angeles will be reduced.

PUC President Stanley Hullett predicted the plan will win approval at the commission’s hearing today.

Although the gas company agreed last week to provide full supplies to utilities during smog episodes, no such agreement existed for clearer days. To make up for the loss in natural gas supplies, the major utilities were forced to shift to low-sulfur oil for their generators. More than 50,000 barrels of oil, for example, were burned in Southern California power plants on Monday, said Marc D. Christensen, a gas company vice president.

Local officials were alarmed by the prospect that Southland skies would become even more fouled when smog is most acute--during the summer.

Hullett said the new plan for distributing gas will give the utilities more flexibility in buying, trading and using natural gas, electricity and oil.

He said the main elements of the plan include:

The promotion of an energy conservation program in Southern California that would warn consumers that failure to reduce electricity consumption will lead to higher utility bills, particularly in the next several months.

Even with conservation efforts, Hullett said, utility bills may climb several dollars a month. But he added that the price will be even steeper if customers fail to reduce their energy use.

Increasing the ability of Southern California Gas to meet its storage goal of 68 billion The gas company’s curtailment was prompted by concerns that storage goals would not be met if the electric utilities received all the gas they wanted.

Hullett said additional gas supplies have been found in New Mexico and will be pumped through interstate pipelines now supplying Southern California Gas. Company spokesman Christensen said, however, that the additional supplies will drive the cost up from about $2.35 to $3.15 per 1,000 cubic feet of natural gas.

Preventing gas-supply curtailment in the Los Angeles area during smoggy days and “to the extent possible minimize the use of oil-fired generation” during clearer days until Nov. 1.

Hullett said the natural gas plan could be implemented in several weeks, but Christensen said the curtailment could be lifted even sooner, possibly by the end of this week.

An effort by Los Angeles utilities to buy as much electricity generated from outside Southern California as possible.

Christensen said representatives of Pacific Gas & Electric and SDG&E; agreed Monday to burn limited amounts of oil to power their generators from now until the end of winter if necessary. As a result, more natural gas will be available to the Los Angeles area, he said.

The San Diego and Northern California utilities agreed only to burn oil in areas where it will not result in violations of air quality standards.

Jim Neugent, SDG&E; fuel contract supervisor, said Tuesday that diverting natural gas to Southern California Edison and other utilities could increase SDG&E;’s own power-generating costs by about 16 cents a month per customer because of the higher cost of fuel oil. He said the utility would try to recoup such costs from Southern California Edison or others benefiting from the gas delivery plan.