State Gives Smog-Belching Oxnard Power Plant 3 More Years, SCE Owns Output
Written by 991KBU on September 2, 2020
A huge setback for clean air in Malibu.
State officials yesterday approved extending the permits for a pair of methane-fueled electric plants 25 miles upwind of Malibu.
The Mandalay electrical generating station … in Oxnard … as well as plants in Huntington Beach and Long Beach will have another three years before they must close down.
A Redondo Beach methane plant got a one year extension.
The Oxnard plant is one of the biggest single sources of air pollution in the Malibu area.
Prevailing winds blow the pollution right down the coast.
Meeting yesterday in Sacramento … the State water resources control Board voted 4 to nothing to allow nine generating boilers to continue to operate for another three years.
Southern California Edison does not own the plants … but it owns the output the output from the generating stations under a little-known contract approved by the California Public Utilities Commission.
Energy officials say the facilities are needed to maintain reliability of the regional electricity grid.
During a big heat wave in mid-August, California endured two nights of rolling blackouts in part because of shortages of wind and solar power.
Fossil fuel backers say those blackouts prove California has over-reached in its efforts to create a green energy grid.
But other energy experts say the problem is not a supply of green energy … but than imbalance in the Southern California Edison grid …
The bottom line is that there are not enough battery or storage facilities for electricity generated by solar, wind and other renewable energy sources.
Yet.
State law says the electricity grid must be 100% renewable by 2045.
The water board has to approve the permits because the fossil fuel power plants kill millions of marine creatures every day I boiling them alive.
Water board members went along with the postponements grudgingly — and said they do not want to grant any additional extensions.
