The nation’s largest public power agency laid out a $25 billion, 10-year plan to the Los Angeles City Council this week to modernize its aging power system and reach a 33 percent renewable energy portfolio by 2020. The comprehensive plan’s goal is to achieve a high level of system reliability, meet environmental standards, and offer customers competitive rates, said Mike Webster, Los Angeles Department of Water & Power integrated resource plan manager. Carrying it out is likely to entail annual power rate increases of 5 percent to 8 percent over the next five years followed by 3 percent to 4 percent annual increases over the next 15 years, Webster told the council’s Energy & Environment Committee Feb. 8. City council documents show that the shift to renewable energy and other elements of the plan could cost as much as $45 billion over the next 20 years for the muni. LADWP supplies power and water to the city’s 3.8 million residents. Unlike previous rate hike proposals, council reception for this plan was relatively calm. Jan Perry, Energy and Environment Committee chair, welcomed the opportunity to discuss the comprehensive plan, contrasting the new long-range view to the muni’s “piecemeal triage” approach to spending in recent years. In hearings last year, the council dramatically trimmed a rate increase the muni proposed to pay for transitioning to renewable energy. At that time, David Freeman was the muni’s acting general manager (Current, April 9, 2010). New LADWP general manager Ron Nichols characterized the current estimated price tag for the long-range plan as only “a gross level cut.” He promised to refine the estimated cost and present it to the public and council in March. Nichols also promised the plan would never be set in stone, but merely serve as a general road map into the future. The plan calls for the muni to repower two major coastal power plants—Haynes and Scattergood—to meet air quality standards and state rules requiring the phase out of once-through cooling. Previously, the muni sought exemption from the once-through cooling policy (Current, Oct. 8, 2010). The two plants are unable to ramp up and down generation and other services like newer facilities, according to the muni. Once started up in summer to meet peak power needs, they can’t be shut down even when demand is slack. This results in continual use of fuel, plus ongoing emissions and cooling water use even when power is unneeded. To avoid the fuel waste and environmental impacts, LADWP plans to replace the old generators with new turbines that start up in as little as 10 minutes, according to Webster. The plan calls for the new units to use dry-cooling. Webster said the plan also calls for the muni to first secure its current renewable energy level at 20 percent and then strive for a 33 percent renewable level. Part of the alternative power supply is short term and longer term resources are being sought. The blueprint further outlines the muni’s plan to end its long-term interest in the coal-fired Navajo Generating Station in Arizona by 2015, ahead of its current expiration date of 2019. LADWP owns 21 percent of the 2,250 MW plant. Nichols added the muni is in discussions that could bring early termination of its 45 percent interest in the 1,900 MW coal-fired Intermountain Power Project in Utah. It currently expires in 2027. LADWP officials noted the plan further calls for up to 360 MW of new solar power—including on customer rooftops and city property—plus investments in energy efficiency—with 10 percent savings as the goal—transmission, and distribution system upgrades.
