Protecting the Park: Front Line Update
CEQA Survives Latest Skirmish
Last updated 8/22/2024 at 8:09am
Assembly Bill 3238 (Edwardo Garcia, D-Coachella) died in the Senate Appropriations Committee on August 16, 2024. By removing protections enshrined in the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), AB 3238 would have given carte blanche to California’s electric grid regulatory agencies to green light a 500 kV electrical transmission line with 200 foot tall metal towers through the heart of the Anza-Borrego Desert State Park (ABDSP).
The bill was opposed by major environmental groups from across the state, including Borrego’s newly formed Desert Protective Trust. Borregans have long relied on the Wilderness Designation given to large swaths of the ABDSP to prevent the siting of a 500 kV transmission line through the Park.
AB 3238 would have removed that protection.
On June 24, Bri Fordem, Executive Director of the Anza-Borrego Foundation, provided testimony in Sacramento before the Senate Environmental Committee. Ms. Fordem described to the Committee what AB 3238 would mean for California’s largest state park: “… hundreds of miles of existing rights of ways” will be “the path of least resistance for hundreds of 200-foot towers permanently scarring our campgrounds, our hiking trails, our sacred cultural preserves, endangered wildlife habitat, dark night skies and more.” “Nothing,” she said, “will be protected.”
Following the hearing, the Committee Chair, Senator Ben Allen (D-El Segundo) called the Park “a special place” he fondly remembers visiting as a child. “I’m personally not going to put my stamp on anything if it’s going to make it easier for folks to run big transmission lines in the middle of the state park,” said Allen. “As written, the bill makes it easier for just that to happen.”
Power companies, including SDG&E, sponsored AB 3238 with the intention of weakening or removing the protections CEQA provides Californians. CEQA was enacted by Governor Ronald Regan in 1970 and is designed to protect the environment from harmful pollution and from large-scale industrial development such as 500 kV transmission lines.
Without CEQA there would be little standing in the way of Horizon West Transmission, LLC building a new 500 kV line through the State Park. Horizon West was selected in May 2024 by the California Independent System Operator as the “Project Sponsor” to build a new 500 kV line called the Imperial County North of SONGS line. Horizon West’s chosen route would replace the unobtrusive 69 kV line that currently runs from the Willows, up Grapevine Canyon, to the Warner Springs substation.
The rise and fall of AB 3238 was a skirmish in the decades-old effort by investor-owned utilities companies to put a 500 kV line through the ABDSP. Pushed by the governor, the three regulatory agencies responsible for maintaining California’s electric grid – the California Energy Commission, the California Independent System Operator, and the California Public Utility Commission – are now in the process of “streamlining” the rules for the siting of new transmission lines that they deem necessary if California is to reach its goal of 100% renewable energy by 2045. What streamlining will look, what form it will take, and what will be sacrificed is the next skirmish. Based on recent decisions it appears California’s regulatory agencies are already in alignment with the investor-owned utility industry, as are many of our politicians.
Rather than advocating utility companies replace existing, inefficient transmission wires with modern designs and materials capable of carrying twice the amount of electricity over existing routes, California’s regulatory agencies have succumbed to the narratives and needs (for profit) of the investor-owned utilities. Replacing existing transmission wires with more efficient materials and designs could be accomplished at a fraction of the cost of building entirely new transmission lines. But doing so would not be as profitable for the utility companies. The more they spend (of ratepayer’s money) on capital investments, the more in federally guaranteed profits they make for their investors.
The necessity of California achieving 100% renewable energy by 2045 is clear. Whether we will get there via a pathway that is good for the environment and the pocketbooks of Californians or a pathway that is good for the profits of the investor-owned utility industry is the battle that looms before us. For those wanting to support the people of California in this struggle, please visit the Desert Protective Trust at http://www.desertprotectivetrust.org.
