:quality(70)/arc-anglerfish-arc2-prod-sfr.s3.amazonaws.com/public/UPYXM3Z6YNFSNOZ4LM7HSSQELI)
A proposal to create a municipal electric utility—aimed at making Santa Fe carbon neutral sooner than later—appears to be fizzling out.
Executives at the Public Service Company of New Mexico say it's a "misguided" idea and the power giant has no intention of selling their system within the City Different. At the same time, City Attorney Kelley Brennan points to numerous legal hurdles if the city tried to force the investor-owned utility to sell out through a process called condemnation.
Brennan this spring sent city councilors a memo supplementing an analysis on the issue from last December. The March 6 memo suggests the complex legal framework involved would be costly and litigation could tie the city up in court for years.
With the proposal all but shelved, former Santa Fe County Commissioner Paul Campos says he doesn't think elected leaders should just leave the decision up to PNM.
"It will take political will and some real backbone to make tough decisions," says Campos. "Now is not the time to delay. It's urgent we provide clean energy to people in Santa Fe. Having a public electric utility will create jobs and have the added benefit of keeping local money in town."
The key, Campos says, is for councilors to adopt an ordinance modeled after one in Albuquerque in 1974, which authorized the state's largest city to own its own power supply (even though that never happened).
"You can't get very far without making this kind of commitment," he claims.
Having an ordinance like that on the books, Campos suggests, would be a powerful tool to bring PNM to the table, making it easier for city staff to work with state lawmakers to address legal barriers and start collecting numbers to assess the fair market value of the investor-owned utility's system in Santa Fe.
The struggle to provide 100 percent carbon-free energy sources to Santa Fe consumers has been going on for years. In 2012, city and county leaders jointly commissioned a $50,000 study from New Energy Economy and MSA Capital Partners on the feasibility of operating a publicly owned power company. But that report's recommendations languished until January, when the City Council adopted a resolution directing city staff to study all options. After that came Brennan's memo.
Will PNM ever have a good power plan?
Under the gun to replace power it will lose when it shutters two coal stacks at the San Juan Generation Station in two years, PNM officials are urging New Mexico regulators to quickly review and approve its latest proposal.
But at least one renewable energy advocacy group, which has been locked in a contentious legal battle with the investor-owned utility, says not so fast.
Mariel Nanasi, the president of New Energy Economy, says there are still a lot of legal questions up in the air about the plan that emerged just last week, including its costs and environmental impact. Nanasi says she wants to know if executives at the publicly traded company went too far “looping commissioners in” on its case and signing restructuring deals with its California partners before getting state approval.
She says she thinks other PNM critics are “giving up” their opposition to the utility’s plan to acquire an additional 132 megawatts of coal power and its proposal to bring energy into New Mexico from its Palo Verde 3 nuclear plant in Arizona, because they believe approval is now inevitable.
“Naturally, we would like to see a true evaluation of all energy resource choices made on a consistent and comparable basis; if PNM had complied with this legal requirement, then the public would understand what a bad deal this is for them. PNM is afraid of this exercise because solar and wind are better on every measure: cost, climate, health and the environment, and are equally reliable,” says Nanasi.
As she pursues potential rule violations, PNM lawyers are filing their own motions. They want to review Nanasi’s emails and are asking the feisty nonprofit to provide information on its graphic design firm and what financial news sources its board of directors reads.
It’s a move, Nanasi says, that’s meant to bog down and intimidate the group.
If it gets PRC approval later this year, PNM has now agreed to consider closing the San Juan Generation plant in 2022 once its new coal supply contract and plant partnership agreements expire. The utility has also agreed to conduct an analysis of the costs and benefits of renewable energy sources by 2018 and find a way to reduce the costs of nuclear power it sells to New Mexico consumers.
Where and how Santa Fe gets its power in the future has also been on Mayor Javier Gonzales' mind. At an energy meeting with US Department of Energy Deputy Secretary Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall and New Mexico US Sen. Martin Heinrich on Aug. 13 at Santa Fe Community College, Gonzales suggested the dangers from climate change should be driving the way the community thinks about getting its power.
"Changing the way we produce and use energy is about dealing with the biggest threat to our way of life that we have faced in generations," the mayor told attendees at the summit.
While efforts to take over PNM's system are on hold, the city hasn't been sitting on its hands. Over the past eight years, it's become a little more self-reliant, with 25 percent of city facility energy now generated by photovoltaic panels. A 600-panel solar installation at the Genoveva Chavez Community Center and arrays at the Water Division are among the city's newest projects.
John Alejandro, the city's renewable energy manager, has also been working to identify a consultant to complete an energy performance audit on city facilities. It will, Alejandro says, help him determine the best way to take advantage of renewable energy technology.
It's a lofty goal, but Heinrich, who shared his own solar panel installation experiences with people at last week's summit, said, "New Mexico should aim high."
Santa Fe Reporter