The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) Region 6 office in Dallas is holding a volunteer effort through Feb. 28 to train exploration and production workers about health and safety issues at sites in Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas. The National Service, Transmission, Exploration & Production Safety Network, commonly known as STEPS, is participating. Participating companies may choose to hold training events at their work sites with OSHA materials. A commitment form and training tools to conduct job site inspections is available online through the OSHA Education Center at the University of Texas Arlington website.

California is preparing for a second summer in case one of two nuclear plants at the 2,200 MW San Onfre Nuclear Generating Station (Songs) remains idle. The lack of generation puts pressure on natural gas-fired and alternative generation sources, according to the California Public Utilities Commission, which has approved five aggregator demand response contracts each for Pacific Gas and Electric Co. and Southern California Edison Co., the owner/operator of Songs (see Daily GPI, Aug. 14, 2012).

The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) has been criticized for shoddy bookkeeping in a state-conducted audit of the regulatory commission’s 14 special funds, seven of which had variances of more than $1 million each. State Department of Finance auditors directed the CPUC to implement a corrective action plan in the next 90 days. The state’s primary regulatory body was called out for various management and accounting shortcomings, although the audit conceded that in most cases the reasons for the accounting variances have been identified. In all, the audit alleged there were $189 million in reported revenue variances and $212 million of variances in expenditures during the past seven state budget cycles. The audit was begun last July after discrepancies in the agency’s budget prompted an investigation.

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