California to build five natural gas plants to prevent blackouts. Will Fresno get one?
By Yesenia Amaro
August 20,2021
California plans to build five temporary natural gas plants to prevent blackouts and one of those plants will be in Fresno County, according to a local lawmaker.
The Department of Water Resources will install five natural gas plant generators at three powerplants in the state, according to the office of Jim Patterson, R-Fresno.
A total of $171.5 million has already been allocated for the implementation, according to the California Department of Finance.
Patterson confirmed news of the plants during a press conference Friday. His office later told The Bee that one of the generators will be installed at Midway Peaking Plant near Mendota in Fresno County.
His office confirmed plants would also be sited in Yuba City in Sutter County and Roseville in Placer County. Two generators will be at Calpine Greenleaf 1 located near Yuba City, Patterson’s office told The Bee late Friday. Two more will be installed at the Roseville Energy Park located near Roseville.
He said the gas-fueled generating plants will consist of a total capacity of 150 megawatts, with 30 megawatts for each unit.
Bloomberg first reported on the plans on Thursday.
Patterson said his “hunch” is that the state’s use of the plants won’t be temporary, noting that they will be licensed for five years.
The decision to install the five plants has been a result of flawed policies by decision-makers, he said.
“California has been forced to do this because we now have growing demand on a grid that has flattening supplies and that has caused these Flex Alerts,” he said. “Our grid is destabilized because of political decisions.” (emphasis added by writer)
From 2009 to 2019, there were two Flex Alerts per year, he said. So far this year alone, he said, the state has had about six Flex Alerts. With high temperatures this year, Californians have been urged to conserve electricity during certain hours.
“Now, as a result of the policies that are coming out of the state Capitol, we are increasingly seeing a grid that is close to being unbalanced,” he said.
Alisha Gallon, a spokeswoman for Patterson’s office, said the office only became aware of the plans through a reporter.
“There have been no official announcements to my knowledge,” she told The Bee. “We have no statement from the Governor or DWR (Department of Water Resources).”
The Department of Water Resources was in the process of procuring, installing and operating the five 30-megawatt generators at the three powerplants, according to an Aug. 10 letter from the California Department of Finance.
“Based on preliminary reporting, Finance has determined that funding for these critical activities must be secured immediately to allow the Department to secure these additional resources for expedited deployment,” the letter reads. “Accordingly, the Director of Finance is allocating $171.5 million from the Disaster Response-Emergency Operations Account.”
The Department of Fiance, in the letter, says it has reviewed the information and agrees with the “estimates and need to make an initial allocation to address these immediate needs.”
It’s unclear whether the $171.5 million is just for the initial allocation or the total amount needed.
The Department of Water Resources will began its work related to the generators within 120 days from Gov. Gavin Newsom’s July 30 “state of emergency to safeguard the state’s energy system this summer,” according to the letter.
“Now we see the order that these natural gas plants are going to pop up — and one of them in my area here in the Fresno area,” Patterson told reporters.
He said California has been gambling that it can supply the fifth-largest economy in the world with electricity, primarily from wind and solar energy, which are not available at all times.
“It just seems to me that so many of these clueless politicians just don’t understand,” he said. “Now California is being forced to essentially use these sources of natural gas for electrons.”
Lisa Lien-Mager, deputy secretary for communications with the California Natural Resources Agency, provided a statement to The Bee on behalf of the Newsom administration.
“Californians are seeing the impacts of climate change firsthand — record heat, extended drought, deadly wildfires and extreme weather events — all of which are more frequent, more intense, and of longer duration than expected,” she said in the statement. “This summer’s climate change-induced events such as extreme heat, drought and wildfire are beyond traditional models and have led to emergency actions to ensure Californians have the power they need during net peak times when our clean power is not available.”
The extreme heat the state has been experiencing, she said, causes a reduction in the output of power plants, increases the risk of outages and reduces the available imports into the state at peak hours.
“These temporary generators are a contingency to shore up grid reliability in the face of extreme heat challenges this summer across the West,” Lien-Mager said in the statement.
California, she said, remains focused on tackling climate change through “clean energy policy, working towards renewable energy portfolio standard of 60 percent by 2030.” The state also has a benchmark for zero-carbon resources to supply all retail sales of electricity by 2045.
“If anything, the recent emergencies highlight why we are moving urgently toward carbon neutrality and renewable energy,” she said.
END of the piece.
Message to council members… If the California electrical grid is not stable, as the article indicates, and per that article, the State of California recognizes it and is taking measures to use NATURAL GAS to supplement it, why would you want to make an ordinance that prevents the continued use natural gas in our city? Please re-read my previous email sent to city council regarding this issue. Natural gas as an energy source is dependable, unlike electricity, and by my calculation (in that email) the banning of natural gas appliances in Menlo Park will make next to zero difference in world wide climate change. And per Dave Price’s Opinion piece, “… President Biden’s climate czar, John Kerry, admitted that even if the U.S. reduced its emissions to zero, it wouldn’t make much of a difference in the global climate change fight"
Please stop being political and use some common sense!
You should also read Dave Price’s Opinion piece in today’s Daily Post.
