Firm Drops Plan for South Gate Generator

Making good on a promise to abide by the will of local voters, a power plant developer announced Thursday that it will withdraw plans for a 550-megawatt project in South Gate and look elsewhere for a location.

The decision by Sunlaw Energy Partners was the second victory in two days for environmentalists and South Gate officials who contended that the plant’s pollution would jeopardize the health of millions of residents in southeast Los Angeles County.

That message apparently resonated with voters, who voted 2 to 1 on Tuesday against the $256-million plant on an advisory measure. Sunlaw had promised to kill the project if voters opposed it.

“I am incredibly disappointed with the voters of South Gate,” Sunlaw President Wayne Gould said during a news conference at the firm’s Vernon headquarters. “Either our message was not received, not understood or not accepted.”

Still, Gould said, Sunlaw will look for a new location to construct the natural-gas power plant in an effort to help solve the state’s energy crisis. He said that other cities have expressed interest but, citing possible industry competition, he declined to name those cities or even say if they are in the county.

“We need to build more power plants,” Gould said.

Members of Communities for a Better Environment, a Huntington Park-based group that held rallies and marches to protest the project, shouted in happiness Thursday when they learned of Sunlaw’s decision.

“We are overjoyed at the news,” said Alvaro Huerta, an organizer for the group. “It just shows that when common people unite and organize they can defeat multimillion-dollar organizations.”

Surprised but Happy

South Gate Vice Mayor Xochilt Ruvalcaba, who a week ago began a hunger strike with her sister and Mayor Raul Moriel to protest the power plant, said she was surprised but happy that Sunlaw executives had lived up to their promise.

“Finally, the voice of the people has been heard,” Ruvalcaba said Thursday.

Moriel’s fast ended Monday when he collapsed from dehydration. He has since recovered. Ruvalcaba and her sister, Flor Ruvalcaba Real, continued to fast until the election results were posted Tuesday night.

Huerta and Ruvalcaba pledge to remain vigilant and fight plans to relocate the project to any community in the southeast county, which already has some of the worst air pollution in the region.

“They need to take it somewhere where it won’t harm any person, child or senior citizen,” Ruvalcaba said.

Jan Smutny-Jones, executive director of the Sacramento-based Independent Energy Producers Assn., a statewide trade group of power generators, said the Sunlaw withdrawal is a bad precedent because it allowed neighborhood opposition to affect the power supply for an entire region.

He noted that the state Legislature gave the California Energy Commission the sole authority to reject or approve power plant licensing so that local opposition does not jeopardize the state’s power supplies. The proposed South Gate plant, called Nueva Azalea, was under that commission’s review, with a decision expected in August. The plan had the preliminary support of regional air quality monitors.

“The NIMBY [Not In My Back Yard] problem is serious if we don’t figure out how to get through that,” Smutny-Jones said. “If people want electricity at reasonable prices, we are going to have to build power plants or modernize older plants.”

Opponents fought the South Gate project by accusing Sunlaw of environmental racism for siting the project in the mostly Latino, working-class community.

Expensive Campaign

But Gould said the South Gate parcel was selected because it is near power transmission lines and natural gas supply pipelines. The parcel also has access to reclaimed water, which is needed to cool the plant’s turbines, he said.

Sunlaw had launched an expensive campaign to win support for Measure A, an advisory initiative placed on the ballot Tuesday by the South Gate City Council.

Sunlaw hired Leo Briones, a campaign consultant who is married to state Sen. Martha Escutia (D-Whittier). Sunlaw distributed glossy fliers and direct mail pieces to persuade voters that the project would benefit the community.

Gould declined to say how much his company had spent on the campaign, but Sunlaw representatives said it was more than $150,000.

In the campaign literature, Sunlaw promised to build the cleanest power plant in the country by relying on a relatively new pollution-control system that has been used in two smaller Sunlaw power plants in Vernon.

The campaign material also cited Sunlaw’s promise to pay as much as $6 million in annual tax revenues and $150,000 annually in community scholarships, plus $1 million in neighborhood improvements near the plant.

Sunlaw also offered to sell electricity at discounted rates to South Gate and neighboring Downey.

The plant was proposed for a 13.5-acre site that is now occupied by a diesel truck depot south of Southern Avenue, next to the Long Beach Freeway. The plant would have been nearly the size of Dodger Stadium.