Greens like idea of renewable energy, balk at reality

An environmental coalition called Californians for Solar and Clean Energy has submitted more than 700,000 signatures for an initiative measure that would compel the state’s utilities to use renewable sources for 40 percent of their electric power supplies by 2020 and 50 percent by 2025, a sharp increase in what the state’s current policy requires.

The underlying notion is to reduce our reliance on carbon-generating fuels such as coal and natural gas and thus contribute to the fight against global warming.

Fair enough. If global warming is the threat to human life that we’re being told it is, and reducing human-caused carbon emissions is the critical factor, then it will require big changes in the way we live, including how we generate and use energy.

As the coalition’s name implies, solar is its preferred form of renewable energy -- tapping the rays of the sun to create electricity through photovoltaic panels -- although geothermal energy, utilizing heat from the Earth’s core, is another source. And, as it happens, California is blessed with copious amounts of both sunshine and geothermal heat.

Merely generating energy from renewable, nonpolluting sources is one thing. Transmitting it from generation sites to where people live is another, and environmental groups that tout renewable energy often oppose transmission lines that would carry the power to homes and businesses, as a long-running battle over a project called “Sunrise Powerlink” illustrates.

San Diego Gas & Electric Co. wants to build the 150-mile-long high-voltage line from solar and geothermal plants in Imperial County to urban users along the coast, but environmentalists and property owners along the proposed route are lining up against it in anticipation of a Public Utilities Commission decision in August.

Environmental groups are especially unhappy with sending the power through Anza-Borrego State Park, even though it would follow an existing power line corridor, while local landowners and governments stiffly oppose alternative routes that bypass the park.

The environmental groups’ opposition follows an odd pattern of supporting green policies in a macro sense, only to oppose specific projects that would implement their larger vision.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who’s proclaimed himself leader of California’s -- and perhaps humankind’s -- anti-global warming crusade, appears to be getting a little frustrated with his supposed allies’ attitude toward specific projects.

“One energy expert the other day said that the California Mojave Desert ... is one of the best spots on planet Earth for solar power plants,” Schwarzenegger said in a speech to a recent climate change conference at Yale University. “Pacific Gas and Electric wants to put three huge solar plants right there. And the whole world -- the Germans, the French, the Canadians, the Japanese -- they all want to come out to California and put solar power plants in the Mojave Desert and in other places. The only thing is that the problem is getting that new energy to the power grid because of environmental hurdles.

“San Diego Gas & Electric wants to develop solar geothermal fields in Imperial Valley and build 150 miles of transmission lines to go and take this power right into San Diego, but it faces opposition even though it would replace an old carbon-based power plant. So the point I’m making is it’s not just businesses that have slowed things down, it’s not just Republicans that have slowed things down, it’s also Democrats and also environmental activists sometimes that slow things down. ... I don’t know whether this is ironic or absurd. But, I mean, if we cannot put solar power plants in the Mojave Desert, I don’t know where the (heck) we can put it.”

Indeed.

ABOUT THE WRITER
Dan Walters writes about state politics for the Sacramento Bee. Write him at dwalters@sacbee.com