New Nevada energy committee begins massive task

Monday, Nov. 6, 2000 | 11:04 a.m.

The scope widened for the 17 members of Gov. Kenny Guinn's new Nevada Electric Energy Policy Committee at its inaugural meeting last week.

The bipartisan panel, commissioned by the governor to make recommendations on the implementation of the deregulation of the electricity industry and to draft a long-term energy policy, began educating itself about the status of the industry and devised a game plan for preparing a report by Jan. 15.

Commission chairwoman JoAnn Kelly, a former member of the Public Utilities Commission, had outlined a strategy to tackle the complex issues of deregulation. She and the committee were asked to explore some additional angles by members of the public who attended and said they didn't think their interests were represented by the committee's membership.

But Kelly was enthused with the public response and said she plans to assign those concerns to subcommittees for further consideration.

The committee, which teleconferenced its meeting in Las Vegas and Carson City, will meet almost every week until that deadline to write the report. The governor is encouraging the inclusion of dissenting opinions if the committee can't agree on some of the thorny issues that lay ahead of it.

Among the concerns raised to the committee:

Allen's concern about power capacity was the basis of two presentations designed to educate the committee about the status of the industry. Kelly told committee members that their first two meetings would include background information about existing facilities and policies. Starting Nov. 16, topics would turn to future strategies and preparing the report.

Thursday's meeting included a state growth overview by Keith Schwer, director of the Center for Business and Economic Research at UNLV, and a status report on electrical capacity by committee member Walt Higgins, chief executive officer of Sierra Pacific Resources, the Reno-based parent company of Nevada Power.

Schwer said his research projects slowed growth for Clark County and Nevada through 2005. But because population and employment will continue to increase over that time frame, power demands should also increase.

But Schwer also said there's no forecast of a new hotel boom nor a high-tech boom in the next five years. New hotels have driven employment and population to higher increases in previous years. And, the greater demand for technology is attributed to the increased need for energy nationwide in the past decade.

Higgins explained how Nevada Power and Sierra Pacific Power, the dominant electricity providers in Southern and Northern Nevada, respectively, are preparing to meet peak electricity demands in the next five years. He illustrated his presentation with charts showing how much the utilities would have available with and without new transmission and power generation facilities.

Higgins broke down existing generation and transmission capabilities, how much power the utilities can count on from buy-back contracts when the companies sell their power plants next year and how much would be available when new power plants come online. He also listed an inventory of power plant projects under construction and under consideration by other companies.

Higgins also explained how Nevada's electrical grid is connected to those in other states and some of the proposed agreements for interconnection, which are federally regulated.

One thing the committee will attempt to learn in future meetings is how much production those power plants could make available to Nevada consumers -- and how much it would cost. Committee members are concerned that many of the power plants that would come on line in the next five years would sell the electricity to California utilities because they could get a higher price there.

In future meetings, the committee will receive briefings on the status of deregulatory efforts in the state to date and capacity and price issues associated with natural gas. Most of the state's existing power plants are fueled by gas delivered by two pipelines.

Committee member Pat Mulroy, director of the Southern Nevada Water Authority, also offered to give a presentation on her agency's power needs. The Water Authority is Nevada Power's largest customer and is planning some of its own power generation.

Representatives of other major state industries -- casinos and mining -- also serve on the committee.