PG&E's new big lie

THE FULL- page ad that ran in the Aug. 5 Independent looked at first glance as if it could have been a message from any of at least half a dozen legitimate environmental and neighborhood groups in San Francisco. "Help us close the Hunters Point power plant," the big, bold headline read.

But up in the right-hand corner was the logo of one of the city's worst corporate criminals, the very folks who have kept that filthy, dangerous plant running all of these years. The ad was paid for by Pacific Gas and Electric Co. And it represents another dirty PG&E trick.

As Matthew Hirsch reports on page 14, PG&E hasn't suddenly decided to embrace the needs of the Bayview-Hunters Point community, which has suffered brutally from environmental racism. The bankrupt private utility isn't changing its ways. Here's what the ad is really about: PG&E is desperately trying to retain monopoly control of San Francisco's electrical system and the city's energy future.

PG&E has known for some time that it may lose the Hunters Point plant. It's almost impossible to justify continuing to operate a facility that is ancient, inefficient, and can't meet modern air-quality standards. But state regulators (who have the final say in the matter) won't allow the plant to close until there's a way to reliably replace that power.

San Francisco's own energy plan sets out modest but attainable goals for energy efficiency and renewable, non-fossil-fuel generation. That might damage PG&E's monopoly, though, because the city plan envisions publicly owned solar, wind, and cogeneration plants (and possibly publicly owned small-scale combustion turbines, which raise tricky issues – see Editorial, 8/6/03 – but could be part of a public power program). And the public power movement is very much alive and well in town, with every major mayoral candidate except Gavin Newsom making at least some public statements in favor of creating a municipal utility.

So PG&E is looking at another plan. The company wants to replace the Hunters Point power with electricity imported up the peninsula, through a much larger PG&E-owned transmission line. That's already created anger in the communities through which the line would pass – the Burlingame City Council, for example, has raised concerns about its siting. There are obvious environmental impacts (the wires have to pass through somebody's neighborhood). And shipping more power along PG&E's lines simply means that someone – either PG&E or one of its private suppliers – has to generate more power somewhere else. That means more fossil-fuel plants spewing pollution into someone else's neighborhood. And, of course, as long as PG&E carries the power on its lines, PG&E controls it, PG&E sets the exorbitant rates consumers pay for it, and PG&E makes monopoly profits from it.

At the bottom of the ad is a coupon that PG&E wants people to clip and return. Those coupons, and any other political traction PG&E can get from this fake environmental effort, will no doubt be used to pressure the state to override the concerns of peninsula communities and force approval of the new transmission line. It's an old, nasty corporate strategy: divide the environmentalists by trying to pit the legitimate concerns of Hunters Point residents against the legitimate concerns of communities like Burlingame.

The bottom line is simple: After all of these years, after all of the lies and corruption and disregard for consumers, the environment, and communities, PG&E can never, ever be trusted. Neighborhood groups and city officials in San Francisco need to publicly reject this latest PG&E big lie and make it clear that the Hunters Point plant should be shut down, immediately – and its power replaced with cleaner, publicly owned alternatives.

Meanwhile, although there's no public power initiative on November's ballot, the voters and political groups that endorse candidates need to be pushing the mayoral contenders to demand a clear plan for creating a workable public power system, in compliance with the federal Raker Act. A good way to start: one of the supervisors should immediately ask City Attorney Dennis Herrera for a formal opinion outlining all of the legal options that could be used to bring public power to San Francisco and suggesting how the city can best comply with the letter and spirit of the Raker Act.

And the Local Agency Formation Commission should make sure that its upcoming report from R.W. Beck and Associates addresses these issues, that there are full public hearings to help sort them out, and that Beck representatives are asked all of the key questions.

PG&E is on the ropes, scrambling to protect and defend a crumbing monopoly. There's never been a more crucial time to keep the pressure on.