Project: Coal Demand Reduction

Summary:

The surest way to keep carbon out of the atmosphere is by leaving coal in the ground. California presently gets over 20% (and America over 50%) of its electricity supply from coal-fired generation plants. In a global climate context it is meaningless for a single state to pursue climate emission reduction goals if they just result in its pollution being passed on to its neighbors. That is why California last year adopted a ban (SB 1368 - Perata) on future long term contracts for electricity supply imported from dirty coal power plants. Working with the Western Clean Energy Campaign and others, CleanPower has been urging municipal utility leaders to say no to coal and yes to renewables for their constituents. The goal of this project is to shut off a significant source of demand for coal fired electricity and thus to reduce its production.

Recent Developments:

Though the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) is California’s most coal-reliant utility, LA’s Mayor, City Council, and LADWP leadership are all strongly committed to reducing that dependence.  Not long ago the city took a huge step in the right direction by withdrawing its participation in the building of a third unit of the giant coal-fired Intermountain Power Plant in Utah, effectively killing that project.  LADWP is also strongly committed to procuring more renewable energy to begin backing out the large percentage of electricity it still buys from coal-based generation outside the state.  

One key to turning this around is the fight to rationalize LADWP’s electric rate structure — a battle that CEERT has been spearheading for the past eight years.  LADWP is the last utility in the Western U.S. to have a “declining block” rate structure (i.e., the more power you use, the lower the price).  This of course discouraged energy efficiency and conservation by sending consumers the wrong price signal for increasing their power consumption.  After exhaustive public hearings, the Los Angeles City Council’s Energy & Environment Committee recently passed a landmark rate restructuring that will remove this major disincentive for homes and businesses to conserve electricity.  The measure now goes to the full Council, where CEERT and other advocates anticipate it will get a positive response.