Greg Lefevre: Californians look to conserve energy

January 12, 2001
Web posted at: 4:46 p.m. EST (2146 GMT)

Greg Lefevre

CNN San Francisco Bureau Chief Greg Lefevre is monitoring California's power crisis.

Q: What is California doing to try to avoid any major power outage throughout the state?

LEFEVRE: They're trying to do several things. First, they're trying to get people to conserve. That seems to be working. And it's not just individuals conserving, but also businesses. For example, San Francisco City Hall abandoned its usual Thursday night meetings. The city officials in essence said, "We need to use that electricity elsewhere."

In the city of Walnut Creek, every other street light was shut down. As I drove home late Thursday night, I drove through a tunnel and the lights that usually illuminate the tunnel were reduced by half.

So, you see signs of conservation in many, many places. At Pacific Gas & Electric offices late Thursday afternoon, we could see from our office building that lights at PG&E were being shut off before the offices were closed for the day. . You could see people working from the lamps on their desks.

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The other thing the state is trying to do is bring back up power plants that have been shut down over the past couple days. The shutdowns have occurred for maintenance and due to the heavy weather we've had this week.

Had the storm passed through quickly as most of them do, we would not have had nearly the trouble that we did. But the storm just hung out off the coast of Northern California and kept spinning, creating heavy surf, high winds and heavy rain.

What that did was it caused a number of the coastal power plants that rely on seawater for their cooling to either shut down or reduce their capacity.

The big example is Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant. The operators at Diablo Canyon found that their intake valves, the cooling valves, were being clogged by kelp and other debris that had been churned up by the surging seas. They had to reduce the plant's capacity down to 20 percent of normal -- that is a reduction of 80 percent.

Other plants had reductions as well, though most not as severe as Diablo.

In addition, there were other plants that had been shut off for maintenance purposes. About two-thirds of California's generating capacity are several decades old. These are aging power plants that require lots of maintenance to keep running. These plants needed to be shut down or they would simply fail altogether. Many of those plants are ready for operation again this weekend.

The third factor is Friday is an easier energy consumption day in California. Many people work Sunday-Thursday workshifts. So, not as many people are at work Friday. Also it's the beginning of a three-day weekend with Monday being the Martin Luther King holiday.

Q: What's the sentiment among Californians? Are they angry or just more concerned about the possibility of losing power?

LEFEVRE: The sentiments are both anger and concern. Californians are extremely angry over the skyrocketing prices of energy. . Many Californians, according to recent polls, are extremely skeptical that there really is an actual energy shortage. Rather, many Californians simply believe they are being gouged by a limited number of suppliers under California's new deregulated utilities.

They are also very concerned. When rolling blackouts hit your neighborhood, problems happen. Streetlights go dark, businesses go dark, homes without electricity get cold. While we have not had rolling blackouts yet, that threat . makes people sit up and notice.

As for rising energy costs, in my case at home, my gas bill just came. On January 5, my gas rate was 75 cents per therm, the unit of energy as to how natural gas is billed in California. On January 6, my price per therm went to $1.50.