Los Angeles says so long to coal
Los Angeles has officially moved away from coal.
City officials on Thursday announced that the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power has stopped buying coal-fired electricity from the Intermountain generating station in Utah, the last remaining source of coal.
“This is a defining moment for the City of Los Angeles,” Mayor Karen Bass said at a news conference. “Los Angeles’ divestment from coal is not just about stopping the use of coal to power our city, it’s also about building a clean energy economy that benefits every Angeleno. This milestone will further accelerate our transition to 100% clean energy by 2035.”
Electricity generation is one of the biggest causes of climate change, and burning coal is the most climate and environmentally destructive way to produce energy. The city is committed to achieving carbon-free energy over the next decade by investing in cleaner technologies such as solar, wind, battery energy storage and hydrogen.
California is slowly transitioning away from coal, which will provide only 2.2% of the state’s electricity by 2024. California Energy Commission. Nearly all of that came from the Intermountain Power Project, which provided 11% of Los Angeles’ energy last year. In 2016, DWP divested itself of another major coal source, the Navajo Generating Station in Arizona.
“This transition has been years in the making,” DWP chief executive Janisse Quiñones said in a statement. “This reflects the hard work of our employees, the support of our customers, and the leadership of our elected officials. Together, we are building a cleaner, more resilient energy future for Los Angeles.”
More than 60 percent of the city’s energy supply now comes from renewable sources, Quiñones said. newly completed Eland solar plus storage center in Kern County, which began supplying L.A. and Glendale in August. The facility is one of the largest solar plus battery power plants in the country.
That’s a huge change from 20 years ago, when the city’s energy mix consisted of about 3 percent renewable energy and more than 50 percent coal, Bass said.
But Los Angeles isn’t completely free of fossil fuels. The city will continue to benefit from new natural gas-fired units at Intermountain. They can run on a fuel mix of natural gas and up to 30% green hydrogen, with plans to switch to 100% green hydrogen in the future. (City officials said green hydrogen is expected to be added to the fuel mix next year).
DWP board also recently approved an $800 million plan to convert two units of the Scattergood Generating Station in Playa del Rey to run on a mix of natural gas and green hydrogen; A similar goal is to run entirely on hydrogen as more supply becomes available.
Some energy and environmental groups have criticized the plan, which they say extends the life of fossil fuel infrastructure at a time when the city should be focusing directly on proven clean technologies such as solar, wind and battery energy storage.
Still, many celebrated the end of coal power in the nation’s second-largest city as a major step forward, especially at a time when the federal government is working against clean energy and promoting coal, oil and other fossil fuels.
“This is an extraordinary, extraordinary day,” Evan Gillespie, partner at nonprofit decarbonization organization Industrious Labs, said during the press conference. When he first moved to Los Angeles nearly 20 years ago, he noted, his attempt to power the nation’s largest utility from coal was seen as audacious and even ridiculous.
“If every public institution, every city, had the courage and leadership that this city has, the world would be a very different place today,” he said. “I know that the model we are creating here will help the rest of this country and the rest of the world follow in Los Angeles’ footsteps for the next 20 years.”
