Redondo reviews, stays at 100 percent renewable energy
by Garth Meyer
Redondo Beach will remain a default 100-percent renewable energy town after a city council vote April 5 to reaffirm.
Councilman Nils Nehrenheim dissented. The decision followed controversy over unexpectedly high electric bills in January.
Councilman Todd Loewenstein subsequently called for a review of the city’s commitment – made last fall, to take effect this October. Nehrenheim and Councilman Zein Obagi, Jr., supported the second look.
Last week, after Ted Bardake, CEO of Clean Power Alliance (CPA), spoke to the council, Loewenstein and Obagi voted to keep the city at 100 percent, joining representatives Laura Emdee and Christian Horvath.
“The real culprit here is SCE (Southern California Edison),” said Obagi, Jr., referring to two thirds to three-fourths of a resident’s bill that pays SCE to send power here – and its subsequent maintenance and wildfire containment costs.
Loewenstein agreed with Obagi.
“Mr. Bardake has been very generous with his time explaining things,” he said. “Rates have stabilized since December. A lot.”
Nehrenheim did not follow suit.
“This is directly taking money out of people’s pockets,” he said. “You’ll get more people (to participate) if it’s done willingly. We’re making a lot of decisions for people we should not be making. This is being forced upon everyone.”
Nehrenheim continued, asserting that it should be individuals’ choice to go to 100 percent with the CPA – and it costs residents more.
“Cities directly benefit from higher energy rates, through taxes,” he said. “It’s essentially a tax grab into people’s wallets.”
Horvath said he agreed with him, in part; that the CPA community-choice policy allows an individual to “opt up, opt down or opt out.”
“If it’s SCE, there’s no choice. People should have a choice, and now they do,” said Horvath, who is also a CPA boardmember.
The cost increase for Redondo residents is expected to be in the 1 – 3 percent range.
Obagi cited his 19-month-old daughter.
“This adds value to the world she’s going to grow up in,” he said, noting that electricity through the CPA’s purchased power (wind, solar, hydroelectric and geothermal) makes the gas -powered AES plant here less necessary.
Nehrenheim made a motion to put the city back on a 50 percent renewable default with SCE.
No second came.
During public comment, Redondo School Board member Rolf Strutzenberg spoke, in agreement with Nehrenheim, suggesting the city go to 100 percent renewable with SCE.
“You can save money and do everything you want for the environment.” Strutzenberg said.
Craig Cadwallader of the Surfrider Foundation, South Bay Chapter “strongly encouraged” the city to stay with CPA at 100 percent renewable. Rylee Goldfarb, a junior at Redondo Union High School, told the council she collected 700 signatures, on two petitions (online and hard copy) asking for the city to remain with the CPA at 100 percent. ER