Company Tries to Speed Restart of 2 Generators

California’s largest private power generator is trying to fast-track a plan to bring a pair of mothballed generators back on line in Huntington Beach, igniting criticism that the company is trying to reap profits at the expense of the environment during the energy crisis.

The company, which just paid a record $17-million pollution fine in Los Angeles, is trying to add power at a plant that is being examined as a possible contributor to sewage problems that have plagued Huntington Beach.

Under proposed legislation crafted by AES Corp., the electric giant’s refurbishing project would be allowed to begin right away, without permits. A speedier permit process that would give the California Energy Commission sole oversight, cutting local input, would be pursued as the project proceeded.

Normally, such projects cannot go forward until they win complex and time-consuming approvals from an assortment of city, county, state and federal agencies.

AES site manager Ed Blackford acknowledged that the bill drafted by company officials amounts to a virtual “wish list”, but also said that it has yet to be introduced, and that there were no plans to flout important safeguards in getting the plants back on line.

In fact, he said, AES would be taking what would amount to a $140-million risk by going forward with construction when it could learn months from now that it does not meet with state approval.

“If it’s decided that it’s not a good project, we don’t generate any power, we don’t turn it on. But that’s a gamble we’re ready to take because we think it’s a sound project and important for California.”

AES officials said the pair of generators, about 50 years old, which were taken out of service in 1995 under the former ownership of Southern California Edison, could be up and running as early as June, providing an extra 450 megawatts to help fill the state’s appetite for electricity.

But Huntington Beach officials, frustrated at the possibility that their voices won’t be heard, argue that AES is further exploiting a crisis that has already garnered the company windfall profits. AES reported a 262% increase in net income in the first nine months of 2000, or $420 million.

Local officials’ biggest fear is that the governor and other lawmakers, in a rush to keep California’s lights on, will let the measure sail through without taking a hard look at the environmental and economic havoc that an expansion might wreak in a community known worldwide as Surf City.

“This is a bad way to make policy,” said City Councilwoman Connie Boardman. “I think the AES is using the energy crisis to advance their own bottom line. And why have a process at all if you’re going to allow construction before certification is granted?”

She added: “We’d be starting a really bad precedent with this bill.”

Topping the list of local concerns is a recent theory of UC Irvine scientists that the AES plant is a possible cause of pollution that closed the city’s beaches in the summer of 1999. The scientists have suggested that the intake at the power plant--which already uses 300 million gallons of ocean water daily as a coolant for its operations--might be combining with currents to pull in bacteria-laden sewage that is discharged miles offshore each day by the Orange County Sanitation District.

“If this theory proves true, we could have double the beach closures. It wouldn’t only ruin the environment. It would ruin the economy,” said Councilwoman Debbie Cook.

In December, regulators slapped AES with a record $17-million fine for spewing more than 1 million pounds of smog-forming emissions from its Long Beach power plant. As part of the settlement, state-of-the-art pollution controls are being attached at Long Beach and Redondo. They should be fully installed by summer, Blackford said. AES bought the Huntington Beach plant, which sits on oceanfront property, and two others in Los Angeles County from Southern California Edison, which was forced to sell them under California’s 1996 deregulation law.

Recognizing local concerns, Blackford promised that the company would be fully prepared to remedy any future problems that are proved to be tied to the plant.

“We’re not advocating circumventing any law or doing anything to take away the beach or local tourism,” Blackford said.

“We’re trying to meet a need in a crisis and be a good environmental citizen. Maybe that’s not enough,” he said. “There could be wordage added to the bill to make everyone feel comfortable.”

Newly elected Republican Tom Harmon, who represents Huntington Beach, is miffed that AES officials went outside his district to find a sponsor. Harmon said he was working Tuesday on language for the bill, after a copy of it was forwarded to him by Los Angeles Assemblyman Roderick Wright, a Democrat, who heads the Assembly’s Utility and Commerce Committee. Harmon and Blackford said Wright had been asked to sponsor the bill. Wright did not return calls for comment.

“The way I read this, to take it to the ultimate extreme, is that you couldn’t even have a building inspector out there to make sure things were being bolted right,” said Harmon. “We cannot simply abandon local review and oversight.

“Yes, the state absolutely, positively needs more generating capacity. And I think everyone wants to do whatever they can to fast-track these proposals. But I will never support any kind of fast-tracking that leaves local jurisdiction out of the loop.”

City Council members are still worried.

“I think Tom is going to try to get some mitigation measures in there for us,” Cook said. “I’m just not sure he can, with the political winds right now.”