Sensing more political interest in possible overlap and duplication among state energy agencies, California’s three major state energy organizations announced this month they are jointly sponsoring a draft “energy action plan” that establishes “shared goals and specific actions” to assure adequate, economic and environmentally sound electricity and natural gas supplies.

The agencies will hold a public hearing Tuesday in Sacramento to review the draft that was made public by a subcommittee of the California Energy Commission (CEC), Consumer Power and Conservation Financing Authority (power authority), and California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC). It calls for five joint actions:

In the prelude to the draft, the agencies speculate that California will compose the fifth largest economy in the world by 2010 with 40 million residents. The state’s “economic prosperity and quality of life are increasingly reliant upon dependable, high-quality, and reasonably priced energy,” the draft stated.

“Following the biggest electricity and natural gas crisis in its history, the state is well aware of the need for stable energy markets, reliable electricity and natural gas supplies, and adequate transmission systems.”

The draft acknowledges that volatile wholesale natural gas prices “contributed significantly” to the energy crisis in 2000-2001, and that there are still lingering concerns about alleged manipulation of the market and scarcity within that market. Gov. Gray Davis has a natural gas working group in place to monitor supply, demand and price issues, but the state “remains vulnerable” to what it called the “volatile spot market.” It advocates four steps:

In the draft’s concluding statement, the three agencies recognized that the document represents a “challenge,” but they said it is “an important step” that the agencies are taking together to help assure the state’s energy future.

©Copyright 2003 Intelligence Press Inc. Allrights reserved. The preceding news report may not be republishedor redistributed, in whole or in part, in any form, without priorwritten consent of Intelligence Press, Inc.