Monday morning: Specter of power blackouts haunts regulation debate

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Monday morning: Specter of power blackouts haunts regulation debate
Officials, looking ahead to 2010, clash on when the state might run short of electricity.

By Carrie Peyton Dahlberg -- Bee Staff Writer
Published 2:15 a.m. PST Monday, January 26, 2004

When it comes to forecasts of energy disaster, California has no shortage.

A senator who wants new market rules predicts potential blackouts this summer.

Regulators who recently approved a controversial south state power plant deal said they were acting to avert possible energy shortages in 2006.

Pacific Gas and Electric Co.'s bankruptcy settlement, criticized as far too expensive for consumers, was defended as a way to keep blackouts from darkening California's door.

Ever since a series of blackouts shocked California and bemused much of the rest of the nation in early 2001, preventing outages has become the rallying cry for virtually anything electric that anyone has wanted to build, buy or sell.

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