Redondo Beach joins “virtual power plant”, targeting AES
by Garth Meyer
Redondo Beach has had a physical power plant since 1954. It will now have a virtual power plant, which may help shut down the former.
Leah Goodman, business development and partnerships manager for Ohmconnect, spoke to the Redondo Beach city council April 12.
She explained what a “virtual power plant” is.
During a surge in demand for power, OhmConnect, based in Oakland, taps its members to conserve kilowatt hours of energy, byway of free devices attached to home electrical outlets.
For example, during peak time, users’ refrigerators would turn off for an hour or two.
The aim is to conserve enough energy so that (backup) power generators such as the AES plant in Redondo Beach are not necessary.
The city council voted 4-0 to offer the program to residents. Councilman Todd Loewenstein was not in attendance.
Participation is free. Residents earn cash payments and/or prizes for kilowatt hours saved.
“Ohmconnect pays people for not using power when it’s most expensive,” said City Attorney Mike Webb, who brought the proposal to the council. “When power prices go up, the idea is ‘we can meet the need by X amount of reduction’… helping the oldest power plant on our coast into retirement.”
Ohmconnect has also noted what Webb suggests.
“Our public relations team is very excited by Redondo’s story,” Goodman said. “We’re going to take it and leverage it to shut down this peaker power plant.”
Ohmconnect is registered with the state the same way an actual power plant is, contracting with the California Public Utilities Commission.
Instead of selling the commission power, Ohmconnect “sells” a package of less energy – in turn contributing to keeping a “peaker plant” offline.
Peaker plants, like AES in Redondo, are those not normally in operation. They only come online in times of high demand.
So companies like Ohmconnect aim to keep that demand low enough that peaker plants stay shut down.
City Attorney Webb made a comment that this was one of the few items he has brought to the city council that he thought would draw full agreement.
“It fits with everything this council is united behind,” Webb said.
Ohmconnect has been in business for eight years, part of a new generation of “demand response” energy companies, a concept which originally developed in the 1970s.
To get people to sign up, Goodman told the Redondo city council of her company’s media outreach kit.
“We will create a campaign to promote it,” she said.
Mayor Bill Brand noted the state’s view of the AES plant, which he and others in Redondo Beach have argued is no longer necessary.
“We have a 70-year-old power plant continuing to operate because we haven’t met our energy goals,” said Brand. “It’s kind of embarrassing for the state, frankly.”
Councilman Zein Obagi, Jr. told Goodman he signed up for Ohmconnect on his computer during the discussion.
“You’ve clearly made it super easily-accessible,” said Councilman Christian Horvath. ER