PG&E solar conference insensitive to union workers and the public

PG&E solar conference insensitive to union workers and the public
By Barbara George and Maurice Campbell

You may have heard there’s a big solar conference in San Francisco this week10/18-21. Priced high for regular folks, it is designed for industry insiders. Do you wonder whether the San Francisco working person or the poor will see some benefit?
http://www.solarpower2004.com/category.php/17.html

• SF unions are picketing the Hyatt, where the Conference is being held. Hotel workers have been locked out of their jobs for weeks because they had the nerve to ask for economic security and health benefits. San Francisco is a union town. Why hasn't the conference been moved to another location?
link: Locked Out http://sf.indymedia.org/news/2004/10/1704134.php

• PG&E is co-sponsor, with SF's public power agency, SF Public Utilities Commission. Doesn't that seem a little strange? PG&E has opposed renewable energy development for 30 years and fought public power in SF for nearly 100 years, most recently in 2001 in 2002 elections clouded by ethical lapses linked to PG&E.
link: 2001 public power election http://www.sfbg.com/News/36/07/07edpge.html
2002 http://www.sfbg.com/37/17/news_fame.html

If you think PG&E may have had a change of heart, read on:

• There is nothing listed on the program about SF's Energy Independence Ordinance, passed unanimously by the Board of Supervisors this year. It is designed to quickly provide 40% of SF's power from renewable energy & efficiency based on "Community Choice", a 2002 State law authored by Carole Migden (with rules to be decided very soon at the Calif. PUC). SF is the first of 60 Calif. cities and counties preparing to use the law to make their own decisions on what kind of energy to buy for their residents and businesses (while continuing to use utility power lines). A feasibility study for 26 cities shows Community Choice can provide 40% renewables with NO short-term rate increase and vast savings to ratepayers over time.
link: Local Power http://www.local.org/independ.html

• There is nothing on the program about SF Solar Bonds (Prop H), passed in 2001 which gives SF Supervisors unlimited bonding authority for solar, wind and other renewables and energy efficiency. Prop H is a companion to Community Choice. (The other Solar Bond measure, Prop B, was declared illegal, but there are no legal impediments to Prop H.)
link: http://www.localpower.org

• Lennar Corp. IS featured on the program. Lennar is the former Mayor's sweetheart choice to develop Hunters Point Shipyard — a non-union Florida company notorious for building housing on toxic dumps. Lennar is embroiled in scandal after illegally canceling a radio broadcast of a public meeting where "community benefits" were to be questioned and discussed. What are they trying to hide?
link: Developer Deception http://sf.indymedia.org/news/2004/10/1704168.php

• There is no panel on global warming or depletion of oil and natural gas — hot topics these days that lend urgency to the development of renewable energy and energy efficiency. US energy corporations have worked for decades to cast doubt on the international scientific consensus and prevent development of sane solutions. PG&E is currently fighting hard at the CPUC to restore its monopoly over energy efficiency and kill independent programs that save more energy — and cut into PG&E's profits.
links:Lessen the dependency on oil http://sf.indymedia.org/news/2004/10/1704048.php
http://www.whoi.edu/institutes/occi/currenttopics/climatechange_wef.html climate change
http://www.womensenergymatters.org current campaigns/ energy efficiency
contact Barbara George at bgwem [at] igc.org
contact Maurice Campbell at mecsoft [at] pacbell.net