Tuesday, Feb. 20, 2001 | 11:13 a.m.
CARSON CITY -- After testimony Monday that they have little control over consumer pricing, supplies and construction of new power plants, state legislators this morning began to learn that everyone can make a difference in the pending energy crisis.
Conservation was the word of the hour this morning before the Senate Commerce and Labor Committee as the second of four consecutive hearings on energy issues got under way.
On Monday, committee members were told numerous decisions that could affect the state's financial future are completely in the hands of energy companies and the federal government.
The 1998 merger of Sierra Pacific Resources and Nevada Power actually resulted in the mandate that the companies sell certain plants. Both companies requested the sales, which were approved by the Public Utilities Commission, as a condition of the merger.
"We specifically declined to make that a part of deregulation," Sen. Mark Amodei, R-Carson City, said referring to the 1997 session's deregulation bill.
But today as California faces more rolling blackouts and Nevada's own energy supplies dwindle, nobody wants the state's power companies to sell anything.
"Unlike other areas that are left to the states to regulate, neither this Legislature nor the (Public Utilities Commission) have control of a big part of this," said committee Chairman Randolph Townsend, R-Reno.
PUC Chairman Don Soderberg said several factors remain hurdles to implementing deregulation, including natural gas supplies, transmission lines and water usage in Southern Nevada.
"At some point we're going to have to decide is the best use of water a new power plant or a new subdivision," Soderberg said.
During earlier hearings, the committee learned about a number of power plant projects slated for construction. But Sen. Dean Rhoads, R-Tuscarora, wondered if California is also building power plants.
"Are they going to look at us and that power goes West?" Rhoads asked.
Soderberg said market forces will dictate whether the new power plants sell their product in Nevada or transmit it to Southern California, Arizona or Utah.
Again the senators learned they had little control, either on whether the plants sold the power, or at what price.
Sen. Ann O'Connell, R-Las Vegas, recently chaired a Government Affairs Committee in which the city of Gabbs was recommended for dissolution because of its trying economic times. She asked PUC officials to prepare a chart for her to show people - especially in Elko - that describes exactly what role the state legislators can play.
Townsend asked Bob Shriver, the executive director of the state's Commission on Economic Development, to help open the doors for renewable energy sources to build in Nevada.
Geothermal and wind-generated power could provide almost instant power to rural Nevada and help the state's overall reliability on traditional power plants, he said.
It is only now with the state facing an economic crisis, and potential blackouts of its own this summer, that renewable energy enters the lexicon.
"Nobody wanted to talk about the renewable energy sources that we control," Townsend said. "Now we have to look at that."
By offering companies long-term contracts, Townsend said he hoped Shriver could help jump start the production of several renewable energy plants.
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