Californians Urged To Fight Surging Electricity Bills

TORONTO -- - With California's power grid strained to the breaking point and customers outraged over soaring bills, angry officials Thursday urged a "ratepayer rebellion" to challenge the industry in America's first deregulated electricity market.

California's top utility regulators, after hearing the complaints of consumers whose bills have doubled or tripled this year, approved a $100-million US rebate for electricity consumers in San Diego, the city worst hit by the power crisis.

Moments later, officials who had come to the meeting from San Diego said the action by the Public Utilities Commission was too little, too late, and urged customers to refuse to pay more than they paid a year ago.

"It is starting here, it is starting now. It is a ratepayer rebellion," said San Diego Supervisor Dianne Jacob. "We're telling people to go back to paying what they did in July 1999. What can they do? There are three million of us."

Power grid areas in New England and New York had similar strains on electricity management in early June. But California is in particular trouble because its growing tech industry has sharply increased demand.

Patrick Dorinson, spokesperson for California's Independent System Operator, which co-ordinates power sharing between utilities, said California's energy deregulation hasn't worked smoothly in conjunction with other traditionally regulated states.

"If you deregulate in California and your neighbours haven't, you've got a lot of different systems out there," he said.

A population boom in places like Phoenix has diminished the amount of power California can import from the Southwest. And in the Pacific Northwest, where the Bonneville dam wholesales power to western states, water has been diverted this summer for such things as salmon runs.

High demand and tight supplies mean higher prices -- particularly in San Diego, the first area in the U.S. to buy power in the open market.

In San Diego and a slice of southern Orange County served by San Diego Gas and Electric Co., bills have jumped 200 per cent in some areas.

Deregulation wasn't supposed to work this way. A complex 1996 state law sought to boost competition in the state's $20-billion electrical power industry, then pass on the expected savings to customers.

The law will be phased in gradually, from south to north. The state's largest utility, Pacific Gas and Electric Co., is expected to join deregulation by 2002.

The law, signed by former governor Pete Wilson, was generally supported by the electrical industry but viewed with suspicion by consumer groups.

"It was ramrodded through the legislature in two weeks by utility companies who donated more than $3 million to lawmakers that year," said Harvey Rosenfield, an activist with the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights in Santa Monica.

This year's cost hikes and continuing power shortages during the summer hot spell have spurred demands of a repeal.

Under deregulation, private utilities were required to sell their power plants, open their markets to electrical resellers and buy power on the open market, paying an amount that may fluctuate from day to day.

Source: Associated Press