[00:00:08] Speaker A: Good planets are hard to find now.
Temperate zones and tropic climbs and run through currents and thriving seas.
Winds blowing through breathing trees, strong ozone, safe sunshine.
Good planets are hard to find. Yeah, foreign.
[00:00:39] Speaker B: Listeners, it's every other Sunday again and you're listening to Sustainability Now, a bi weekly case good radio show focused on environment, sustainability and social justice in the Monterey Bay region, California and the world. I'm your host, Ronnie Lipschitz.
Everyone is angry at California's private utilities.
Rates keep rising, the utilities lack accountability and they're running roughshod over small scale renewable energy.
Why make your customers so angry? And what are the utilities planning? My guest today on Sustainability now is Loretta lynch, an early critic of the energy deregulation that led to California's electricity crisis in the early 2000s and for which we're still paying today.
Lynch was president of the California Public utilities Commission from 2000 through 2002 and continued as a CPUC commissioner until January 2005.
Since then, she's been a strident advocate for the protection of ratepayers and against corruption, a role in which she continues today.
Loretta lynch, welcome to Sustainability now.
Loretta lynch, welcome to Sustainability now.
[00:01:51] Speaker C: Thank you so much for having me.
[00:01:53] Speaker B: Well, our topic today is really big one and you know, we're not going to be able to cover everything, but I was wondering if we could start with a kind of broad overview of the issues and challenges facing utilities, estate and customers today and over the next 20 years or so.
[00:02:10] Speaker C: Sure. You know, Ronnie, we are at a.
[00:02:12] Speaker D: Historic transition point, not only in California and the United States, but throughout the world.
[00:02:18] Speaker C: For the first time since we have.
[00:02:21] Speaker D: Had large scale commercial electricity, people now.
[00:02:25] Speaker C: Have the ability to control how they.
[00:02:27] Speaker D: Make, use and store electricity.
Electricity used to be unique as an essential good or an essential commodity in.
[00:02:37] Speaker C: That you had to use it when you made it or you lost it. But now with technological advances, we now.
[00:02:43] Speaker D: Have energy storage systems that work and they work on a massive scale.
[00:02:50] Speaker C: So for the first time, we can decide how we want to design our energy systems, where we want the electricity to come from, what sources, how we're going to produce our electricity, whether it's.
[00:03:02] Speaker D: From fossil fuel or clean fuels, and also how we're going to create the systems so communities can have a voice and a choice.
[00:03:14] Speaker C: And that's new. That is new for the 150 years of electricity commercial production coupled with California's.
[00:03:24] Speaker D: Old 20th century top down utility owned.
[00:03:28] Speaker C: System is old, creaky and doesn't work very well. And so a lot of it needs.
[00:03:33] Speaker D: To be replaced both just because of.
[00:03:36] Speaker C: Age, but also because of utility mismanagement and failure to maintain the system.
So that presents an opportunity.
[00:03:43] Speaker D: Are we going to just recreate the.
[00:03:46] Speaker C: Big expensive utility owned and controlled system that we had in the 20th century or are we going to reimagine and.
[00:03:54] Speaker D: Re envision a whole new way of making sure the lights stay on at a reasonable price, not just affordable for some, but so that everyone can participate without breaking their, the, the bank or picking their pocket? And also are we going to do it in a clean way that's going.
[00:04:14] Speaker C: To reduce pollution and reduce all the.
[00:04:17] Speaker D: Incredible harmful health effects that have mainly.
[00:04:21] Speaker C: Accrued to communities, low income communities where the big stinky power plants have been located.
[00:04:27] Speaker D: So I'm actually hopeful because we have a choice and we the people can.
[00:04:33] Speaker C: Make the right choice for the first time since this, since electricity became an essential good.
[00:04:39] Speaker B: At the same time, there's a lot of resistance to this, to this vision and transition, isn't there?
[00:04:46] Speaker D: Well, sure, because the people who have.
[00:04:47] Speaker C: Made the money want to keep making.
[00:04:49] Speaker D: The money and the people who have.
[00:04:50] Speaker C: Profiteered want to keep profiteering. And so we have huge moneyed interests aligned to recreate the 20th century system.
[00:04:59] Speaker D: Where people don't have a choice and people don't have a vote and, and people's pockets just continue to get picked. But in some ways the fact that California system is so broken and the.
[00:05:12] Speaker C: Fact that our regulators are so compromised really helps us see clearly what those choices are. Because if it were just a little bit bad, I'm not sure people would care. But as we all know, every Californian.
[00:05:27] Speaker D: Who lives in a district that is served by a private utility corporation knows you're paying too much for electricity, you're paying too much for natural gas and you get in a jalopy system that you can't count on in return.
[00:05:42] Speaker B: Well, I want to get back to that because it's a, it's a couple of important points there. But I'm just wondering, you know, what is your background? What are you doing these days?
Who are you anyway?
[00:05:54] Speaker D: Well, I'm a working class girl who's.
[00:05:56] Speaker C: A first generation college graduate and certainly.
[00:05:59] Speaker D: A first generation law school girl graduate.
[00:06:02] Speaker C: I became a lawyer, I worked for legal aid for a while, I clerked for a judge, and then I worked.
[00:06:06] Speaker D: At big law firms in both Washington.
[00:06:09] Speaker C: D.C. and in San Francisco to pay off my student loans and to be.
[00:06:13] Speaker D: Able to buy a place to live and a car.
[00:06:16] Speaker C: But then I went into state government.
[00:06:18] Speaker D: And I was Gray Davis's head of.
[00:06:22] Speaker C: The Office of Planning and Research, which.
[00:06:24] Speaker D: Is the office that deals with general.
[00:06:28] Speaker C: Plans and planning for all of the.
[00:06:30] Speaker D: Cities and counties in California.
[00:06:32] Speaker C: But I was also kind of his Girl Friday.
[00:06:34] Speaker D: And as part of that, I was the liaison to the Public Utilities Commission.
When Gray's first Public Utilities Commission president.
[00:06:43] Speaker C: Quit to go work for Al Gore, he appointed me as the new president six months before the first blackout that.
[00:06:50] Speaker D: California had in 2000.
[00:06:51] Speaker C: So we were off to the races.
But what was great about it was.
[00:06:55] Speaker D: My prior work as a white collar.
[00:06:59] Speaker C: Criminal defense lawyer in San Francisco was.
[00:07:01] Speaker D: Really put to the test immediately.
[00:07:05] Speaker C: So I went after Enron and its.
[00:07:06] Speaker D: Cronies and we caught them basically after a lot of work and sturm and drawing and also after they had profiteered over $40 billion in excess profits out of California's pockets.
So I feel very strongly that not.
[00:07:25] Speaker C: Only does electricity need to be clean, but it also the costs have to.
[00:07:30] Speaker D: Be reasonable because we saw what it did to California's economy 20 years ago.
[00:07:35] Speaker C: But most importantly, I saw what it.
[00:07:37] Speaker D: Did to real people like my family and probably your family, where people were struggling to pay the electric bill and they were having to make hard choices about whether they were going to keep the lights on or whether they were going to feed their kids.
[00:07:53] Speaker B: We should maybe give a little bit more background to that, that energy crisis of, you know, the early 2000s, because although many of our listeners will remember that very well, you know, there may be some who have never heard of Gray Davis or of the deregulation, the supposed deregulation of the private utilities, the investor owned utilities, or IOUs, which is the shorthand will be using for the rest of the show.
What was going on there?
[00:08:22] Speaker D: Well, actually, it was before my time. I came on the scene in 1999.
[00:08:26] Speaker C: After the stage was set for the.
[00:08:28] Speaker D: Crisis, after the bills were passed and.
[00:08:31] Speaker C: After all the legal work was done.
[00:08:33] Speaker D: To make sure that California couldn't control its own destiny. But basically what was happening was a.
[00:08:39] Speaker C: Wave of what they called deregulation in the 80s and 90s.
[00:08:43] Speaker D: But at least for electricity, it was.
[00:08:46] Speaker C: About federalization of regulation.
So no longer would states that chose.
[00:08:52] Speaker D: To have electricity markets.
[00:08:54] Speaker C: That was the mantra.
[00:08:55] Speaker D: Markets are good, bigger markets are better.
[00:08:58] Speaker C: So let's have markets and we'll all.
[00:09:00] Speaker D: Have cheaper, cleaner, more reliable power.
That wasn't true.
[00:09:05] Speaker C: It wasn't true then and it's certainly not true now.
[00:09:08] Speaker D: Markets lead to market manipulation, and that's what was happening.
[00:09:12] Speaker C: So California passed a law in 1996.
[00:09:14] Speaker D: Before I came on the scene that was going to turn over our control of our electricity system and a large part of our control over the private.
[00:09:25] Speaker C: Utility corporations to the Federal Energy Regulatory.
[00:09:29] Speaker D: Commission or the ferc. And the FERC had these entities that.
[00:09:35] Speaker C: Are also private corporations. They're not government called regional transmission organizations.
[00:09:40] Speaker D: And these things ran both the transmission grid, which takes the power from the power plant to the people, and also.
[00:09:49] Speaker C: They ran the, they created and ran new electricity markets where the price of.
[00:09:54] Speaker D: Power had no relationship to what it.
[00:09:57] Speaker C: Cost to make the power. The price of power was just what the buyers and sellers agreed upon. And the FERC in the early days, in the late 90s and early 2000s.
[00:10:06] Speaker D: Basically just let the, the sellers, Enron.
[00:10:10] Speaker C: And its cronies profiteer and run rampant in these markets.
[00:10:14] Speaker D: So California, myself and other energy leaders and also legislators clawed back all the legal authority we possibly could and we went after those profiteering companies, sellers, and we held some of them accountable, actually.
[00:10:33] Speaker C: Despite the federal government's active interference in both the legal cases and also in.
[00:10:39] Speaker D: Our legislative attempts to get a handle on the profiteering and manipulation.
[00:10:46] Speaker B: As I recall, the essential matter was that these companies like Enron were buying power and reselling it, right? And when demand was high, the prices in this market, the then market would go up. And they found that by withholding electricity from the market, they could drive the price up to atmospheric levels, stratospheric levels. That's the turn. Do I have that correct?
[00:11:14] Speaker C: Oh, you absolutely do.
[00:11:15] Speaker D: The actual cost to make power in.
[00:11:18] Speaker C: 2000 was about 4 1/2 cents a.
[00:11:20] Speaker D: Kilowatt or $45amegawatt, basically $4 and 50 cents a megawatt. Sorry.
And so that meant that, you know, if, if you were buying power for five bucks that was still kind of expensive, or it would be $50. Sorry, I'm getting my exp of numbers not correct.
[00:11:43] Speaker C: So instead of spend spending $45 or $50amegawatt for electricity, power prices rose to.
[00:11:51] Speaker D: $4,000Amegawatt, $4,000amegaww, exponentially high and nothing anybody could ever pay. And when we went and knocked on.
[00:12:01] Speaker C: The FERC store and said, you got to stop this, this is just absolutely.
[00:12:04] Speaker D: Price gouging, they kind of dithered and wrung their hands.
[00:12:08] Speaker C: And so we took actions to go after.
[00:12:12] Speaker D: And we eventually proved that they were in fact colluding and manipulating the market.
[00:12:18] Speaker C: So there were some protections after there.
[00:12:21] Speaker D: Were U.S. senate hearings, congressional hearings on this, some protections that the FERC grudgingly gave California.
[00:12:29] Speaker C: And I will Note, it was the Bush administration's ferc, not the Clinton administration's.
[00:12:32] Speaker D: FERC, that finally put some price controls and some other regulatory guardrails on our market.
[00:12:40] Speaker C: But it was also California ourselves. And what we did was we took.
[00:12:44] Speaker D: That control of our electricity market Board called the Independent System Operator or the California ISO.
[00:12:53] Speaker C: And we told the board, you're not.
[00:12:55] Speaker D: Going to let the sellers run rampant through our economy anymore.
[00:12:58] Speaker C: You're going to pay attention and not allow profiteering.
[00:13:02] Speaker D: And that worked for about 20 years. But very sadly, the current California ISO is once again allowing sellers to profiteer and run rampant. And you might recall just five years.
[00:13:16] Speaker C: Ago, in the summer, we had blackouts.
[00:13:18] Speaker D: In 2020 and we had near blackouts in 2022.
[00:13:22] Speaker C: And a bunch of big data scientists worked with me to prove that those.
[00:13:27] Speaker D: Blackouts and near blackouts were caused by the ISO's market policies and not by any lack of power.
[00:13:36] Speaker C: So as you said, what happens is.
[00:13:38] Speaker D: The sellers just withhold their power until.
[00:13:41] Speaker C: The price goes up high enough that they deign to sell it to us.
In many markets, that's not allowed. They have a must offer obligation.
[00:13:51] Speaker D: And if you're going to participate in.
[00:13:53] Speaker C: The market, you must offer whatever power.
[00:13:55] Speaker D: You'Ve got at the beginning of the day and not at 3 o' clock when the price goes up a thousand percent.
[00:14:01] Speaker C: But very stupidly, and I would argue.
[00:14:04] Speaker D: Collusively, the California ISO doesn't require that of California sellers. And so guess what? They sit on the sidelines. They watch the price go up, they watch California's economy sweat, and then they pounce.
[00:14:19] Speaker B: You're listening to Sustainability Now. I'm your host, Ronnie Lipschitz. My guest today is Loretta lynch, who was very active in legal issues around regulation of the state's private utilities. She was the president of the Public Utilities Commission for a couple of years in the early aughts and remained on the commission until 2005, maybe. You know, one of the interesting things about the IOUs is that they're so big they cover, you know, I don't know what fraction of California's electricity system. There are hundreds of utilities, but these three PG&E, Southern California Edison, San Diego Gas and Electric are the, the three big ones. Now, how did monopoly utilities come into existence and why?
[00:15:11] Speaker C: Well, over a hundred years ago, the cities were fighting with the private corporations about who got to serve various communities. And mostly it was the cities that.
[00:15:21] Speaker D: Were electrified and that's where they could make the.
And then there was a push by the private companies to edge out the Cities. So we still have city ownership of.
[00:15:35] Speaker C: Electricity systems in California. We have over two dozen what they call municipal utilities or munis that are government owned, local government owned.
[00:15:43] Speaker D: And you can think about Sacramento Municipal.
[00:15:46] Speaker C: Utility District or SMUD or ladwp. But there's also Palo Alto and Healdsburg and Santa Ana and many other smaller districts are all publicly owned. They're owned by the local government.
[00:15:59] Speaker D: And so those munis have cheaper and more reliable power and frankly, safer power.
[00:16:06] Speaker C: Because they do the maintenance. So they don't have to keep building.
[00:16:09] Speaker D: New because they're not profiting from new utility facilities.
[00:16:16] Speaker C: The privates banded together after the first World War and basically told Woodrow Wilson.
[00:16:22] Speaker D: You want some help in the war?
[00:16:23] Speaker C: Well then you're going to pass some federal laws that are going to disadvantage.
[00:16:27] Speaker D: City owned electric utilities.
[00:16:30] Speaker C: And so they did. And so the problem here is the cities are now precluded by law and.
[00:16:37] Speaker D: For us it's actually state law from.
[00:16:40] Speaker C: Moving outside their boundaries. So while if you live in the.
[00:16:44] Speaker D: City of Los Angeles, you enjoy much lower power prices and frankly you also enjoy much safer and more reliable power delivery.
[00:16:56] Speaker C: But all the suburbs, if it's a.
[00:16:58] Speaker D: Different city government, they don't get that. And, and same here, Palo Alto, absolutely, but not San Mateo, at San Sacramento.
[00:17:08] Speaker C: But not Roseville or Davis. And so we need to change that law to allow municipal utilities to expand.
[00:17:15] Speaker D: And I would argue, given Southern California.
[00:17:18] Speaker C: Edison's negligence in failing to remove an.
[00:17:22] Speaker D: Abandoned power transmission line, a power tower.
[00:17:27] Speaker C: And that's what sparked the Eaton fire, that they shouldn't lose the privilege of.
[00:17:34] Speaker D: Rebuilding Altadena and the Pasadena area because they've already proven that they are not.
[00:17:41] Speaker C: To be trusted with people's lives and our economy.
[00:17:45] Speaker D: And you know what?
[00:17:45] Speaker C: We have three really well functioning municipal utilities that ring that area of Southern.
[00:17:51] Speaker D: California Edison's historic service territory, Pasadena, Glendale and ladwp.
[00:17:58] Speaker C: And they could either band together or they could just take over the whole area of the Eaton fire. And those folks would be so much better served than by recreating Edison's monopoly at top dollar with jalopy results.
[00:18:15] Speaker B: A couple of questions follow from that. First of all, to whom are the private and public utilities accountable?
Okay, why not? Not in terms of regulation, but in terms of, of customers and owners. And then the second one is, how did for instance, PG&E get to be so big? I mean, it must have, I know, it consolidated or it bought up various utilities. Were those private utilities or public utilities? I mean, this is historically so. So the first question is accountability.
And the second one is, how do they get to be so big?
[00:18:53] Speaker C: So some government entity is supposed to oversee or regulate each electric utility.
So for the utilities that are owned by local governments, the city council regulates those utilities and they are not regulated by a state agency called the Public Utilities Commission. It's a misnomer because it's not. It's not. The utilities that are regulated by the PUC are not public. They're private.
[00:19:17] Speaker D: But as in so many things with private utilities, they say one thing and do another.
[00:19:23] Speaker C: So the Public Utilities Commission or the PUC regulates all the private utilities. And the way PGD got to be so big is just what you said.
[00:19:31] Speaker D: It went around buying up all the.
[00:19:33] Speaker C: Little local utilities that were private and became one big behemoth. And then it became even bigger because it created a holding company in the 1990s. And PG&E, the utility is only one part of PG and E Corp.
[00:19:49] Speaker D: The international holding company, mega Corporation.
[00:19:53] Speaker C: But PG&E, the utility, is the cash cow.
[00:19:56] Speaker D: And what they do is they milk.
[00:19:58] Speaker C: Their customers for every penny and then they send those profits up to their parent and their parent spends them around the world.
[00:20:07] Speaker B: The one of the things we've heard about recently is that PGE has gone to the California Public Utilities Commission to get an increase on its rate of return.
Ostensibly because California has become a risky place to do business.
And not only because I suppose the utilities have made it a risky place to do business. But what is the role of Wall street and the shareholders vis a vis the holding company and the utility?
[00:20:39] Speaker C: Sure, Wall street loves the utility to over profit because then Wall street can say, hey, that's a good stock. Look at how much money it's making.
Saps who are their customers.
[00:20:48] Speaker D: And yes, isn't it, one could argue ironic or one could argue disingenuous that.
[00:20:54] Speaker C: PG and E has asked for even.
[00:20:56] Speaker D: More profit because of their actions that make the utility business risky because they.
[00:21:03] Speaker C: Fail to maintain and operate appropriately. And they're basically saying, because we are negligent. And oh, by the way, PG and E has been convicted of criminal negligence over 100 times in the last two decades. 100 counts of criminal negligence they have either pled to or been convicted of. So this criminal felon is saying, hey.
[00:21:27] Speaker D: Because of our criminal negligence, it's a.
[00:21:30] Speaker C: Risky business and you should pay us.
[00:21:32] Speaker D: More profit because we're in a risky business.
[00:21:35] Speaker C: By the way, we created that risk. But don't look behind that curtain. Wizard of Oz.
[00:21:41] Speaker B: So the rate of return is what for?
[00:21:43] Speaker C: It's basically a profit Level.
[00:21:45] Speaker D: So it's a calculation and a formula and all these things are supposed to go into it. And we can get into that if you want. But basically, right now, PG E earns 10.2% on every dollar of capital assets.
[00:22:00] Speaker C: That we pay for.
[00:22:02] Speaker D: So every transmission line, every poll, every hard hat, every computer, their shiny new headquarters over in Oakland, every car they have, every, everything, they earn over 10.
[00:22:18] Speaker C: Cents of every dollar that it took to buy that asset. 10 cents. But it's not just 10 cents this year. They have a depreciation schedule and they are going to profit off of those assets.
[00:22:30] Speaker D: It's called depreciation for the accountants out there over the next 10 or 20.
[00:22:36] Speaker C: Years, depending on what the asset is.
[00:22:39] Speaker D: Not only that, we pay taxes on.
[00:22:42] Speaker C: Those profits because Every single penny PG&E.
[00:22:46] Speaker D: Receives is from its customers. So we pay their profits and then.
[00:22:51] Speaker C: We pay their taxes on their profits. So realistically, 16 to 17 cents of every dollar that you're paying PG and E is going to pay their profits and the taxes on those profits.
And that is why all municipally owned utilities, all city government owned utilities are a lot cheaper, just to start right.
[00:23:15] Speaker D: Off the top, because they're not charging.
[00:23:18] Speaker C: That 16 to 17 cents off of.
[00:23:20] Speaker D: Every dollar you pay in your bill.
And but there's more because they get to profit at 10 more than 10%. And PG&E now has asked for over 11% profit. And you think, oh yeah, what's a.
[00:23:35] Speaker C: Percentage here or there?
[00:23:36] Speaker D: Well, a percentage here or there is.
[00:23:38] Speaker C: A hundred to $150 million.
[00:23:40] Speaker D: That's what that is.
[00:23:42] Speaker C: So we're talking real money every year. Every year, plus of course, the taxes on that.
[00:23:47] Speaker D: So that's going to put it up well over $200 million more just with.
[00:23:51] Speaker C: That one little percent increase.
[00:23:53] Speaker D: Can you imagine? So here we are. But, but then as the good corporate bean counters they are, they are figuring out how they can maximize their profit with every action.
So for instance, if you have a utility pole that is fully depreciated, it's been there for 30 years and you have a utility pole in a high fire threat district that's only been there.
[00:24:18] Speaker C: For 10 years, you would normally say, okay, we're going to replace the older.
[00:24:22] Speaker D: Pole or we're going to replace the.
[00:24:24] Speaker C: Pole that is in the most danger, right? And that might be in the high fire threat district. If it's a wooden pole, we don't know. But no, PG&E makes a choice to.
[00:24:33] Speaker D: Replace the pole that they're not earning profit on anymore. And so the PUC is supposed to.
[00:24:39] Speaker C: Be looking at this to say, hey.
[00:24:41] Speaker D: Are we replacing infrastructure, utility equipment that is going to keep us the most safe, the safest, or are we replacing utility equipment in order to pump up.
[00:24:53] Speaker C: The profits and plump them up of PG and E? And very sadly, it's the second.
[00:24:58] Speaker D: And that's why one of the five major reasons that utility costs and your.
[00:25:03] Speaker C: Bills are out of control.
[00:25:06] Speaker B: Just to, just to clarify that when depreciation means that a certain value, right, of the, of the stock, of the capital stock is that the value is decreased by certain fraction or percentage every year, right?
Until, until it is totally depleted, at which point it doesn't have any value in this, in the, in the overall sort of, you know, plant.
[00:25:38] Speaker C: Well, it's actually not the stock, it's.
[00:25:40] Speaker D: Actually a piece of equipment, right? So let's say the, the best way of looking at depreciation, I think, is.
[00:25:47] Speaker C: Looking at their office building. PG used to have this, this big old 1920s office building in downtown San Francisco. And it earned a profit on it.
[00:25:56] Speaker D: For 30 or 40 years, meaning the.
[00:25:59] Speaker C: Value of the building they got 10%.
[00:26:01] Speaker D: Or more of every year.
[00:26:04] Speaker C: And then, so let's say the building was worth, you know, $100 million.
[00:26:09] Speaker D: Well, if they then get 10% profit, they take $10 million a year on profit on that.
[00:26:16] Speaker C: So then the next year the building.
[00:26:17] Speaker D: Is only worth $90 million because they've taken away the 10 million profit and so they only get $9 million of profit.
[00:26:26] Speaker C: So then the next year the building is only worth $81 million until the building, for accounting purposes, is worth zero. But you and I know that that building is not worth 0 after 30 years. That building has real value to the customers because we paid for it and we paid profit on it for years and years, if not decades. Well, guess what PGD did during the pandemic. They applied to the PUC in 2020 to sell that building, the 1920s landmark in downtown San Francisco, and buy a whole new building in Oakland.
But because they're PG E, they proposed.
[00:27:02] Speaker D: That the money they made on the.
[00:27:05] Speaker C: Sale of a big office building in San Francisco, that they just keep because.
[00:27:09] Speaker D: You know, no harm, no effect.
[00:27:11] Speaker C: And the money that they're going to use to buy that new Oakland headquarters.
[00:27:16] Speaker D: Oh, why don't we have our customers pay for that plus a whole new profit stream?
[00:27:21] Speaker C: And that's what the PUC allowed. PUC said, yeah, you're right. You get to deduct all sorts of.
[00:27:28] Speaker D: Expenses that will offset your, what they call gain on sale of the building.
[00:27:33] Speaker C: You'Ve owned for over 100 years and.
[00:27:35] Speaker D: You'Ll just keep virtually all of that money. I think they might have given 10 or 20% of that, the sale price.
[00:27:40] Speaker C: Back to the ratepayers.
[00:27:43] Speaker D: But then, so they may. Basically the, the PG and E building.
[00:27:48] Speaker C: In San Francisco sold for about $800 million.
[00:27:51] Speaker D: Then they went and bought a 1.2 billion dollar building in Oakland with fancy.
[00:27:56] Speaker C: New furniture and all these other things, blah, blah, blah.
[00:27:59] Speaker D: And guess what, the profiteering starts again.
So this year we're going to pay 10% of the 1.2 billion and next year we're going to pay 10% of whatever else is on that of the.
[00:28:12] Speaker B: Total and not of the total additional cost.
[00:28:15] Speaker C: No, no, no, no, no, no.
[00:28:17] Speaker D: So they got to pocket the profit.
[00:28:19] Speaker C: We had to pay for a whole.
[00:28:21] Speaker D: New building, and now we're paying a.
[00:28:22] Speaker C: Profit on the whole new building. It's a good gig if you can get it. And the PUC shouldn't have allowed it. And the reasoning was, hey, we're going.
[00:28:29] Speaker D: To have to Upgrade this old 1920s building for earthquake stuff.
[00:28:34] Speaker C: Yeah. The worst estimate, the highest estimate they.
[00:28:37] Speaker D: Got was 100 million was a hundred million dollars.
[00:28:41] Speaker C: So that would have been a fraction.
[00:28:42] Speaker D: Of the 800 million they got to sell it. And then the 1.2 billion we had.
[00:28:47] Speaker C: To pay for a new building, plus.
[00:28:48] Speaker D: Of course, all the profit that we're paying. Right. So the PC is like a hundred.
[00:28:53] Speaker C: Million dollars to earthquake proof it. Oh, no, no, no. You go ahead and sell that building and then buy a whole new building and we'll just have the customers pay. So you want to know why your rates went up so high in the last couple years?
[00:29:03] Speaker D: One of the big reasons was PG got a brand new office building and.
[00:29:06] Speaker C: They haven't even filled it. They're now subleasing it. Subleasing big chunks of it. Why?
[00:29:12] Speaker D: Because everybody doesn't have to come back to the office five days a week.
[00:29:16] Speaker B: I have to say, I don't see why the public doesn't own or didn't own PGE's buildings. If it had, if it was paying, you know, off the mortgage and the costs.
[00:29:27] Speaker D: But, oh, we paid for every penny.
[00:29:29] Speaker C: It's like saying, hey, Ronnie, you want a new house? I'll pay for it.
And then you own it. And then maybe you'll give me a good deal and not charge me too.
[00:29:39] Speaker D: Much rent if I, you know, am.
[00:29:42] Speaker C: Basically using some of your new house. Yeah, great deal if you can get it.
[00:29:48] Speaker D: And so that's just one Egregious example.
[00:29:51] Speaker C: Of so many egregious examples, it would.
[00:29:53] Speaker D: Take hours on your show to go through.
[00:29:56] Speaker C: And so people want to know whether.
[00:29:57] Speaker D: Rates are increasing extra exorbitantly. It's because the PUC has stopped making.
[00:30:03] Speaker C: Any sense when it comes to regulating.
[00:30:06] Speaker D: The costs and making choices about what PG&E gets to spend their money, our money on.
[00:30:16] Speaker B: You're listening to Sustainability Now. My name is, I'm your host, Ronnie Lipschitz. I know what my name is. And my guest today is Loretta lynch, who is very active these days as a lawyer in litigation around issues having to do with private utilities, among other things.
She was president of the California Public Utilities Commission for a couple of years in the early aughts and served on the commission until 2005. And we've just been talking about how private utilities, the IOUs, make a lot of money on their properties without ever, you might say, giving us a cut of those properties that we paid for.
Well, Loretta, you've been, you, you've talked, you know, we've talked a little bit about the puc, and, and you just basically propose that the PUC isn't doing its job. How, how is the, the California Public Utilities Commission supposed to work and regulate the IOUs, the private utilities? I mean, what's the theory of and what's the practice?
[00:31:23] Speaker D: So the people of California in 1911.
[00:31:26] Speaker C: Knew that they had a corrupt railroad commission, which was just basically doing the railroads business instead of overseeing the railroads and keeping prices low and safety high.
So they voted for a constitutional amendment.
[00:31:40] Speaker D: To California's constitution to create a new Public Utilities Commission.
[00:31:45] Speaker C: Five members, appointed by the governor and confirmed by the state Senate, who are.
[00:31:50] Speaker D: Supposed to regulate the utilities and keep the costs.
[00:31:55] Speaker C: The phrase, the legal phrases, just and reasonable.
[00:31:59] Speaker D: And the way they're supposed to do.
[00:32:00] Speaker C: That is by digging into the accounting and making sure that every penny the utilities spend is used and useful, meaning it's useful to delivering electricity safely and reliable reliably to their customers. And also they're supposed to make sure that the profits and all the spending are just and reasonable and necessary.
[00:32:26] Speaker D: And so the laws that were on the books in, let's say, 1911 to.
[00:32:32] Speaker C: The 1940s were very consumer friendly.
And the first set of commissioners were very consumer friendly because that was their job, was to look out for the customers.
[00:32:44] Speaker D: However, that then changed over time because.
[00:32:48] Speaker C: There are only five commissioners, which means a vote of three.
It makes the deal. Right? That's the authority.
[00:32:55] Speaker D: And so the utilities very patiently, through lobbyists that we pay for through originally.
[00:33:02] Speaker C: Political, political donations that we used to pay for. Supposedly the shareholders pay for them now and through legions of lawyers and accountants.
[00:33:11] Speaker D: And experts, overwhelmed the regulator.
[00:33:15] Speaker C: And Sacramento and the laws changed to.
[00:33:19] Speaker D: Be very pro utility and so did the regulations.
[00:33:24] Speaker C: So when I Show up in 1999, I am shocked at how pro utility not only the commissioners are, but also a lot, not all, but a lot.
[00:33:35] Speaker D: Of the staff because you just get.
[00:33:38] Speaker C: Worn down over time. It's the flood the zone strategy that we now see very clearly on the national level.
[00:33:44] Speaker D: Well, that's been happening, happening at the California PUC for decades and it's also.
[00:33:48] Speaker C: Been happening in Sacramento for decades.
[00:33:52] Speaker D: And so you get California, frankly, when I was the head of the PUC and a PUC commissioner, I talked a lot with other PUC commissioners across the country and I found out that California.
[00:34:05] Speaker C: Is seen as, because it is one of the most utility friendly states in the country.
[00:34:12] Speaker D: We have some of the highest profit levels and some of the lowest regular.
[00:34:16] Speaker C: Regulation standards in the country.
And that is why we have the second highest prices in the country. Rates.
[00:34:24] Speaker D: And for small commercial customers, which would be say a McDonald's or smaller business.
[00:34:30] Speaker C: They have the highest rates in the country. The highest rates.
[00:34:34] Speaker D: And of course the only folks that were trailing in terms of residential rates is Hawaii. And Hawaii has its own special issues.
[00:34:43] Speaker C: Because it's an island and it's harder.
[00:34:45] Speaker D: To provide electricity and the equipment to an island.
[00:34:49] Speaker C: So here we are.
[00:34:50] Speaker D: California has bottom of the barrel safety, bottom of the barrel reliability, top of.
[00:34:56] Speaker C: The barrel bending over for the utilities in terms of regulation and statutes. And that has created outrageous rates and bills.
[00:35:06] Speaker D: It's not rocket science.
[00:35:08] Speaker C: It's almost inevitable. If you've got that combo.
[00:35:12] Speaker B: Do the. Does, does a commissioner have to have any particular sort of qualifications or expertise to be appointed by the governor?
[00:35:20] Speaker D: Nope.
[00:35:22] Speaker B: So he, he can appoint friends and, and cronies and the like.
[00:35:26] Speaker C: Yep.
[00:35:28] Speaker B: And the present commission, if I may ask, you know who's on it?
[00:35:33] Speaker C: Well, several folks have been lobbyists.
[00:35:35] Speaker B: You don't have to name names, just.
[00:35:37] Speaker D: Right. I understand several folks have in, in before they came on the commission have.
[00:35:41] Speaker C: Been lobbyists for the industries that are.
[00:35:44] Speaker D: Now that they now regulate.
And then others basically worked for the governor.
[00:35:51] Speaker B: Okay.
Well in the old days utilities earned their money by selling electricity, right. I mean, and they had a great incentive to increase volume, encourage electrification.
Now in the deregulate, so called deregulation stripped the private utilities of most of their generating capacity.
So they no longer make and sell most of their electricity to customers. So how do they make their money now?
[00:36:22] Speaker C: Well, I would say PGE still does have significant generating assets. And those assets are the hydro system. PGE owns the largest privately owned hydro system in the world.
[00:36:33] Speaker D: And it's some of the cleanest power.
[00:36:35] Speaker C: That we enjoy as Californians. It's also should be some of the.
[00:36:38] Speaker D: Cheapest power because it's been around for.
[00:36:41] Speaker C: 150 years or certainly 100 years, and.
[00:36:44] Speaker D: We'Ve already paid for all the profits.
[00:36:46] Speaker C: Right. That system is fully depreciated, let's just say that.
And then also Diablo Canyon, the nuclear power plant in San Luis Obispo.
And that too, Californians have paid through the nose on.
[00:37:00] Speaker D: We've probably paid the entire cost plus a ton of profits, double, if not.
[00:37:04] Speaker C: Triple over the years.
[00:37:06] Speaker D: The problem is TGE had made a.
[00:37:09] Speaker C: Deal to close it because it's not safe.
[00:37:11] Speaker D: It didn't meet the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's.
[00:37:14] Speaker C: Tsunami standards after the Fukushima tsunami in 2011.
[00:37:19] Speaker D: But in 2022, our governor, by statute, kept it open through 2030.
And not only kept it open, but.
[00:37:30] Speaker C: Made a special deal about how much PGE gets to charge for making the.
[00:37:35] Speaker D: Power at Diablo Canyon. And so PGE is profiting all the way to the bank yet again because.
[00:37:42] Speaker C: Even the PUC wouldn't have been able.
[00:37:45] Speaker D: To justify the extraordinary rates that PG and E is now charging for Diablo Canyon power because we've already paid for all the equipment.
[00:37:54] Speaker C: I mean, there's some upgrades, but pretty much not.
[00:37:58] Speaker D: So we paid for the big kahuna high ticket expenses already, so that power.
[00:38:04] Speaker C: Cost should have dropped. So what did PG&E do?
[00:38:07] Speaker D: Say, oh, well, we can't keep up these high profit levels through the regulatory.
[00:38:12] Speaker C: System, so we'll go to Sacramento and.
[00:38:14] Speaker D: Get it in a billboard, which they did.
[00:38:16] Speaker C: And now that's the law, so they.
[00:38:19] Speaker D: Get to profit all the way to the bank again.
[00:38:22] Speaker C: So anyway, so that was a little bit of a tangent, but PG and.
[00:38:24] Speaker D: E still is making hefty profits off of its generation, let's just say that. But the other folks were pushed to sell off their power plants and they.
[00:38:33] Speaker C: Did sell them off at record prices.
[00:38:36] Speaker D: And guess what? They got to keep every penny of.
[00:38:38] Speaker C: The profit of those sales.
[00:38:40] Speaker D: And then they were exposed to to.
[00:38:43] Speaker C: The open market and then the manipulated market.
[00:38:46] Speaker D: And the problem is, because it's a federally created electricity market, something called the.
[00:38:55] Speaker C: Filed rate doctrine applies. And if PGE buys power on the market to sell to you and me, whatever the price of that power is on the market, as long as the FERC The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission says.
[00:39:07] Speaker D: That that price is reasonable. They get to pass on, pass through to us.
[00:39:13] Speaker C: So PGE does participate in buying power on the market.
[00:39:17] Speaker D: But more and more the folks who are actually buying power is something called the Community Choice aggregators or the CCAs.
[00:39:28] Speaker C: And most communities in California now have a CCA board and they've taken over.
[00:39:33] Speaker D: Buying the power or creating the power plants, signing contracts for or, or building their own power plants to keep the lights on. So PGE is increasingly not involved in what they call power procurement or power sales.
[00:39:53] Speaker B: So if they're not selling electricity, what are they selling?
[00:39:56] Speaker C: They're selling the system and they're selling their billing system. So the way they make money now is on their equipment. They make money on their transmission system.
[00:40:04] Speaker D: They make money on the, the power poles, they make money on the wires.
[00:40:09] Speaker C: And they make money on upgrades. They make money on their pipelines.
[00:40:13] Speaker D: So what, not surprisingly, they propose to do is replace all that stuff because they've pretty much drained the profit potential.
[00:40:21] Speaker C: Out of their old system.
[00:40:23] Speaker D: So even though a big chunk of their old system is perfectly serviceable and we paid for it all, they'd like.
[00:40:29] Speaker C: To replace that so that they can.
[00:40:30] Speaker D: Start that profit gravy train anew on every single transmission line and every single power pole.
[00:40:41] Speaker B: So the state has this goal, you know, I don't know where it stands right now, right, of, of moving to all renewable energy, But I think 20, 25 electricity, right, and the utilities are deep into to building new transmission lines.
What is going on there?
[00:41:02] Speaker C: Profiteering.
[00:41:05] Speaker D: So if I can build a transmission.
[00:41:07] Speaker C: Line, even if it's to nowhere, it's like the bridge to nowhere. I'll make money.
And the ferc, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, has even loose gooseier rules for.
[00:41:18] Speaker D: Profiteering if they approve the transmission line versus if you go to the PUC to approve the transmission line. So if you go to the PUC to approve the transmission line, you're going to get a little bit over 10%, 10 cents out of every dollar in profit. If you go to the FERC, depending.
[00:41:32] Speaker C: On where that transmission line is and.
[00:41:35] Speaker D: Whether or not FERC particularly likes your project, you can make 30 to 40% profit. And so guess what, there's a backlog of like 8,000 applications to build transmission lines all over the United States because.
[00:41:47] Speaker C: It'S a gravy train that knows no bounds. And so of course, if you could.
[00:41:52] Speaker D: Make 10% profit versus 30% profit, who are you going to go to? Who are you going to call? You're going to call the FERC because.
[00:41:58] Speaker C: They'Re going to let you profiteer off.
[00:42:00] Speaker D: Your own customers in a way that is just obscene.
[00:42:05] Speaker B: Does this FERC then, I mean, have authority only over interstate lines, transmission lines, or also within state transmission?
[00:42:14] Speaker C: Well, if the state is so foolish.
[00:42:16] Speaker D: As to give up their power, and California increasingly is giving up their power over intra state or just inside California transmission lines, then yeah, FERC can approve them. And if the state is so foolish.
[00:42:28] Speaker C: As to give up their power over the smaller lines and not just those.
[00:42:32] Speaker D: Big honkin lines that are out in the Central Valley, if you, if you drive down I5, yeah, then FERC will.
[00:42:39] Speaker C: Step in the gap and approve them.
[00:42:40] Speaker D: So one of the easiest ways we have to keep power prices or to keep transmission line costs and profits lower is if the PUC approves them to the maximum extent possible and only provides a 10% profit versus the profligate profits of the FERC.
[00:43:03] Speaker C: But also, we don't even need most of these transmission lines if we built community based energy systems like we can now with energy storage.
[00:43:13] Speaker B: You're listening to Sustainability now. I'm your host, Ronnie Lipschitz. My guest today is Loretta lynch, who back in the early part of the millennium, the new millennium, was president of the California Public Utilities Commission.
And since she left the commission in 2005, she's been quite active in efforts to regulate and contain both utilities and I would say the regulatory system as well. And we were just discussing the question of transmission lines and their necessity.
Loretta, is all of the hubbub about data centers driving the applications for new transmission lines, or is that how to rationalize the construction of new transmission lines? Because I've seen increasing skepticism that these data centers will emerge as predicted.
And I'm just wondering, you know, do you have a sense of that? Or maybe it's just, you know, the worm, ouroboros, eating its own tail.
[00:44:19] Speaker C: Certainly the data centers are driving a little bit of the demand or the request for new transmission lines. But we had a backlog of over 6,000 transmission line requests way before data.
[00:44:29] Speaker D: Centers came on the scene in the.
[00:44:32] Speaker C: Last five to eight years because the FERC's profits are just too good to pass up.
[00:44:38] Speaker D: So people have been rushing to get.
[00:44:40] Speaker C: Theirs before the FERC closed the loopholes, which they had seemed to have no.
[00:44:45] Speaker D: You know, appetite to close.
[00:44:46] Speaker C: But on the data centers, the data.
[00:44:49] Speaker D: Centers are kind of like the Wild.
[00:44:52] Speaker C: West of the early Internet.
[00:44:54] Speaker D: Everybody was going to be an Internet.
[00:44:55] Speaker C: Company and all the Internet companies were going to need to have servers and all this stuff.
[00:45:00] Speaker D: Well, what we found were, in fact, not everybody is going to be an Internet company. Remember MySpace and Yahoo and you know, all the other ones, right? Yeah, Time Warner.
[00:45:11] Speaker C: Anyway, no, what happens is only a.
[00:45:13] Speaker D: Few big guys are going to come out of this war of both AI.
[00:45:19] Speaker C: And the data centers and then those folks will need data centers for their.
[00:45:25] Speaker D: Or AI areas for their businesses.
[00:45:28] Speaker C: But it's not going to be thousands. It may not even be hundreds, it might just be dozens and it may not even be dozens.
[00:45:34] Speaker D: But they're acting as if for power.
[00:45:37] Speaker C: Purposes, like it's going to be thousands.
What I find the most interesting though is the data centers, the AI data.
[00:45:43] Speaker D: Centers in particular, they don't want transmission lines because they need to have perfect power all the time for the volume.
[00:45:51] Speaker C: And quality of AI that they want to deliver. So what they're doing is they're doing.
[00:45:55] Speaker D: What they call co locating next to.
[00:45:58] Speaker C: Nuclear power plants and coal plants.
[00:46:01] Speaker D: So basically, you know, Diablo Canyon's parking.
[00:46:04] Speaker C: Lot might be the next Google AI.
[00:46:06] Speaker D: Center or Meta's AI center so that they can have high quality 247 power right there, right now, all the time.
[00:46:16] Speaker C: Now they'll still need the transmission lines.
[00:46:18] Speaker D: You know, for regular power production or maybe for, you know, connecting into the AI, but the power production, they want.
[00:46:28] Speaker C: To be as close to the source.
[00:46:29] Speaker D: As possible or they want a dedicated transmission line.
[00:46:34] Speaker C: None of this, you and I get.
[00:46:35] Speaker D: To share their transmission line.
[00:46:36] Speaker C: No, no, no. They want the whole kahuna to themselves, but they want us to help pay.
[00:46:42] Speaker D: For it because they don't want to.
[00:46:43] Speaker C: Pay the full freight, the full price.
[00:46:46] Speaker D: Of a dedicated transmission line.
[00:46:48] Speaker C: So yeah, it's a complicated subject. There are going to be winners and losers. And what we shouldn't do is assume.
[00:46:54] Speaker D: That everybody's a winner and everybody's above average and that you and I have to pay for it all.
[00:47:00] Speaker B: So let's go back to the, the community energy question. I mean, it appears that the state of California, the IOUs and the PUC are now engaged essentially in a war against smaller scale distributed energy resources.
What's the reason? Why are they doing this and what's likely to happen?
[00:47:25] Speaker C: Well, their mamas didn't raise no fools. They understand that people can get off of their system and they don't have to take substandard service at premium prices anymore. They can either put solar on their roof and a battery in their backyard.
[00:47:38] Speaker D: And just go off the system entirely.
[00:47:40] Speaker C: Or they can band together with their.
[00:47:41] Speaker D: Neighbors and put solar on their roofs.
[00:47:44] Speaker C: And share a battery and the collective backyard and go off the system altogether. And so they knew as soon as.
[00:47:51] Speaker D: Battery storage became commercialized and, and, and.
[00:47:57] Speaker C: High quality, they knew that they were.
[00:48:00] Speaker D: Going to suffer customer loss. Anybody who could, and I don't know about you, but I was, I'm. I have a solar solar system on my roof.
[00:48:08] Speaker C: I was the first PUC commissioner in the country to go solar.
[00:48:11] Speaker D: And I went Solar in 2004 after.
[00:48:14] Speaker C: PG E's bankrupt first bankruptcy bailout when.
[00:48:16] Speaker D: I knew they were going to have.
[00:48:18] Speaker C: High rates for the next 15 years. So shoot, solar paid even then.
[00:48:23] Speaker D: So what, what all the utilities in.
[00:48:25] Speaker C: The country, but certainly what the western utilities in sunny areas saw was that solar paired with battery storage was going to lose them customers. And that trend hit the other trend of their excessive spending right in the gut. Because the more you spend, the more customers you need to spread those high.
[00:48:47] Speaker D: Costs across or the spending is unsustainable.
[00:48:51] Speaker C: For a smaller customer base.
[00:48:54] Speaker D: And so right as they saw that customers could actually leave their system, their.
[00:48:59] Speaker C: Spending had already exploded. So in order to support their profligate spending, they have to keep their customers captive. And that's what this war on solar is all about.
[00:49:09] Speaker D: They don't want me to produce even.
[00:49:13] Speaker C: 1 kilowatt of electricity that they don't sell me at premium prices. And so they are turning the screws on every single program that California has successfully used to create rooftop solar which.
[00:49:29] Speaker D: Has lowered our pollution, lowered our carbon emissions and really given many people, frankly.
[00:49:36] Speaker C: 3 to 4 million people in California, households in California, plus businesses, some modicum of energy independence.
[00:49:45] Speaker B: And the California Public Utilities Commission is largely going along with this.
[00:49:48] Speaker D: Oh, they are a collaborator and I.
[00:49:51] Speaker C: Mean in the Vichy sense.
[00:49:54] Speaker B: But why?
[00:49:56] Speaker D: Because if all you do is regulate.
[00:49:59] Speaker C: A private utility and they're in trouble and you're already co opted by the people who are in trouble, what are.
[00:50:04] Speaker D: You going to do? You're going to help them out.
[00:50:06] Speaker B: So essentially it's, it's an agency's effort to stay in business.
[00:50:10] Speaker C: It's an agency's effort to stay in business coupled with their political overlords, the.
[00:50:15] Speaker D: Governor in this case, who are tight.
[00:50:18] Speaker C: Who is tight as sticks with the.
[00:50:19] Speaker D: Utilities and you know, understands that the.
[00:50:23] Speaker C: Choices that have been made, the policy choices that have been made that are.
[00:50:27] Speaker D: So pro utility are really going to.
[00:50:29] Speaker C: Break the economy if you don't keep the customers captive and paying their monthly.
[00:50:33] Speaker D: Bills to PG and E.
Well, we're.
[00:50:36] Speaker B: Almost out of time. So the last question is I suppose the most difficult, which is other two is what what in your view should we do? We be doing the public and citizens and consumers, customers be doing to try and, and prevent this? You might say IOU takeover of, of everything.
And where can our listeners learn more about this?
[00:51:00] Speaker C: Well, the last time I checked we're still a democracy. And that means you have state representatives and a governor who you can call and email and text and say stop allowing the utilities to over profit, overbuild.
[00:51:14] Speaker D: And over buy because that's hurting my, my budget. But it's also hurting California's budget.
[00:51:20] Speaker C: Just stop it and change the law.
[00:51:24] Speaker D: That has allowed the PUC and the.
[00:51:27] Speaker C: Utilities to go to war against their.
[00:51:29] Speaker D: Own customers and give us customer choice, customer access and customer control.
[00:51:36] Speaker C: We should be able to band together.
[00:51:37] Speaker D: With our neighbors or our community.
[00:51:40] Speaker C: And frankly, the public utilities should be.
[00:51:42] Speaker D: Able to expand if people who live in surrounding areas want to be served.
[00:51:47] Speaker C: By the public utilities.
Plus we need to have real court review of the PUC's decision and not just a very crimped and limited court review.
[00:51:55] Speaker D: And we can ask our governor and.
[00:51:57] Speaker C: Our legislators for all of those things and more. And also just next year, this time.
[00:52:03] Speaker D: Next year we're going to be in the thick of a competitive primary for California's governor.
[00:52:09] Speaker C: So every time you see a governor's.
[00:52:11] Speaker D: Candidate come to your to come to your community, go ask them, what are you going to do about the war on solar?
[00:52:17] Speaker C: What are you going to do about.
[00:52:18] Speaker D: The co opted PUC and what are you going to do about these exorbitant and unsustainable bills that we're all paying? What are you going to do about it? Governor's candidate? Because the next governor is going to.
[00:52:30] Speaker C: Have a lot in her or his.
[00:52:32] Speaker D: Lap and we need to make sure that that person's for the people and.
[00:52:36] Speaker C: Not for the private corporations.
[00:52:39] Speaker B: Where can listeners find out more about all of this?
[00:52:42] Speaker C: Well, that's a good question.
[00:52:43] Speaker D: I would go to the Solar Rights.
[00:52:45] Speaker C: Alliance for the War on Solar. I think that those guys do a really good job of explaining what's up there. I'd go to the center for Biological.
[00:52:52] Speaker D: Diversity and also the Protect our Communities.
[00:52:55] Speaker C: Foundation for some of the most egregious examples of what's going on at the puc.
[00:53:01] Speaker D: And then I'd go to your radio show because Ronnie, you are speaking truth to power and you're having all sorts of people on who can really give people the true facts and not the.
[00:53:11] Speaker C: Facts that the utilities want you to believe.
[00:53:14] Speaker B: Well, thank you very much for that endorsement Loretta. And, and thank you very much for being my guest on Sustainability Now.
[00:53:21] Speaker D: I really enjoyed it.
[00:53:22] Speaker C: Thank you so much for having me.
[00:53:24] Speaker B: You've been listening to Sustainability now interview with Loretta lynch about current issues around California's electricity grid and the state's monopoly utilities. Lynch was president of the California Public utilities Commission from 2000 through 2002, and she continued as a CPUC commissioner until January 25th.
Today, she's an advocate for the protection of ratepayers and a critic of corruption by the utilities and other agencies, a role that she relishes and continues today.
If you'd like to listen to previous shows, you can find
[email protected] Sustainability now, as well as Spotify, YouTube and Pocket Casts, among other podcast sites.
So thanks for listening, and thanks to all the staff and volunteers who make K SQUID your community radio station, and keep it going. And so, until next every other Sunday, Sustainability Now.
[00:54:27] Speaker A: Good planets are hard to find. Now tropic climbs through currents and thriving seas, winds blowing through breathing trees, strong ozone and safe sunshine.
Good planets are hard to find. Yeah, good.
