Who will replace Michael Peevey on the CPUC?

By James Heddle Originally appearing in SF Chronicle Clean-energy, nuclear-free and stop-smart-meter activists won’t have Michael Peevey to kick around anymore. The beleaguered, utility-friendly president of the California Public Utilities Commission announced on Oct. 9 that he’ll resign in a move to avoid non-reappointment at the end of his expiring term in December. Peevey threw in the towel just one week after angry citizens held a press conference on the commission steps and packed a boisterous commission meeting to demand his ouster. Peevey’s announcement came after weeks of controversy following disclosures of too cozy e-mail exchanges between him and other CPUC representatives and Pacific Gas & Electric officials in connection with the 2010 San Bruno gas-line explosion. The obvious implication in the public mind is that a cozy relationship exists on other issues and with other utilities, and has become the modus operandi of the commission. “Twelve years as president is enough.” Peevey’s statement in the brief press release announcing that he would not seek reappointment to a third six-year term was ironic to many eyes. Those 12 years spanned the era of deregulation and privatization and were certainly enough for the commission to become the poster child for regulatory capture. Too-friendly relations between regulators and regulatees (i.e., investor-owned utilities, aptly called IOUs) seem to be the norm from the local to the national and even to the global these days — note the International Atomic Energy Agency’s flaccid response to the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan. But the CPUC’s stance toward both Southern California Edison’s bungling at its now-shuttered San Onofre nuclear plant north of San Diego and PG&E’s performance in relation to the rollout of wireless smart meters, San Bruno gas-line maintenance and management of its Diablo Canyon nuclear plant in San Luis Obispo County strikes many observers as especially egregious. Peevey’s 12-year tenure leaves behind a culture of conviviality between the commission and the corporations that puts both the public interest and public safety at risk. Can that culture be reformed by changes at the top? With sweeping structural reform unlikely, attention will now focus on whom Gov. Jerry Brown will appoint as the next CPUC president. Two names already being suggested by progressives are former California Energy Commission executive director and attorney John Geesman, and former Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Gregory Jaczko. You can bet the utilities have their favorite candidates, too. Given that Brown has two former utility vice presidents in his inner circle (Nancy McFadden, his executive secretary, and Dana Williamson, his Cabinet secretary, both worked for PG&E), the likelihood of a major shift in leadership at the CPUC seems slight. But you never know. Public outrage and pressure has brought us this far. Now is the time to organize, agitate, advocate and push hard for the changes we want. James Heddle is co-director of the Ecological Options Network. www.eon3EMFblog.ne t

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Who will replace Michael Peevey on the CPUC?

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