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Running low -- yet againCalifornia endures second day of blackouts
Summary: California continues to struggle with its power troubles, as authorities issued the second straight day of rolling blackouts after the state's electrical grid ran short of power. The latest wave of outages, affecting at least 500,000 homes in the state, follows similar blackouts earlier this year. State, industry and federal officials have spent the last few months looking for solutions -- some calling conservation key to getting California back on track, others emphasizing creating and finding new energy supplies.SACRAMENTO, California (CNN) -- Despite pleas to conserve energy and untold government and industry-wide talks to find power sources, authorities in California ordered a second day of rolling blackouts for parts of the state on Tuesday. The blackouts, which will affect the northern and southern parts of California, are the first to hit the state since January.
California's Independent System Operator, which manages the statewide power grid and gauges the state's energy availability and capabilities, ordered utility companies to cut power consumption by 500 megawatts. The move sparked blackouts, typically lasting between 60 and 90 minutes, in areas selected by the individual utilities and occurring roughly between 9 a.m. and 10 p.m. High temperatures in southern California, maintenance problems at one power plant and a fire at another generator stretched the state power supply to peak capacity on Monday, triggering blackouts that day. More than 500,000 homes already have been affected by the latest outages, compared with the over 675,000 northern California households left without power several months ago. With tight natural gas supplies, low water supplies and likely heat waves, California officials expect even more rolling blackouts, particularly this summer. Many in the Pacific Northwest and Washington insist the problem goes beyond just California. President George W. Bush has said the nation, not just California, is in an energy crisis. "The energy crunch we're in is a supply-and-demand issue," Bush said on Monday. "And we need to reduce demand and increase supply." 'Our load continued to climb'One of the state's main power suppliers, Pacific Gas and Electric, cut 102,000 customers at 9:20 a.m., said spokesman Jon Tremayne. The move trimmed 196 megawatts of consumption in northern California.
A megawatt, or a million watts, of electricity can power about 750 customers. The standard used to be 1,000 customers, but the number of appliances most people have in their homes has gone up. The amount of power a given person uses is relative, with most appliances running between 4,000 watts for a hair dryer to 3 watts for a clock. The total power demand is innately high in California given that it is the most populated U.S. state, with more than 33 million people according to 1999 U.S. Census Bureau estimates. Peak demand throughout California topped 29,000 megawatts this week, California ISO Vice President Jim Detmers said Monday. Call for less reliance on outside energyBush said Monday that the nation is not generating enough of its own power supply. He stressed that his administration ordered federal agencies to expedite the review and licensing of new power plants in California. Promising a "very comprehensive and balanced" energy plan in coming weeks, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham said the United States is too reliant on other countries for its energy.
"I think it's important for the United States to be less at the mercy of foreign countries and their decision-making and politics, and more under our own control to address these problems," Abraham said. Economics also factor into this rationale, especially given the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) decision to cut oil output by a million barrels a day, thus raising oil and gas prices. Bush insisted that if gas prices go up, it would be because the United States did not have enough oil refining capacity. He extended this reasoning to high power prices as well. "We haven't built a refinery in 25 years in America. We're not generating enough gasoline to meet demands," he said. "It's the same as natural gas -- we're not exploring for enough national gas to meet demand. We're not building enough power-generating plants to meet demand, and we're beginning to pay the price." Economics an issue on West CoastMoney is very much a part of California's problems, which have been blamed on high power costs due to a 1996 law deregulating the industry. The law put caps on what customers could pay, but there was no limit on wholesale electricity costs -- what utility companies had to pay to remain solvent. California's two largest utilities, Southern California Edison and Pacific Gas and Electric, say they have lost $13 billion since last year because of high wholesale electricity costs. Energy wholesalers have been reluctant to provide power for fear of not being repaid. Small independent power generators with around 6,000 megawatts of generating capacity were off-line this week, amplifying California's power troubles. While the ISO offered no explanation, some of the generator operators have said they cannot operate because they have not been paid by the electric utilities they serve for power they generated in the past.
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