Raissa Arielle Kasa Ngoma <[email protected]>
Item 17 . SB 540 Support Letter (Action Item) - Oppose SB 540 1 message
'Tom Kunhardt' via Clerk of the Board <[email protected]> Wed, Mar 19, 2025 at 5:40 PM Reply-To: Tom Kunhardt <[email protected]>
To: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] Please share this email with the Ava Board prior to 6pm tonight 3/19/2025.
Dear Ava Board,
Please Oppose SB 540 or at least delay a rushed vote recommended by your staff. Loretta Lynch has the right idea and made an excellent case for opposing SB 540. She is an expert with total independence from all current stakeholders.
SB 540 would open up California to a larger grid regionalization system, meaning Californian energy market participants would be buying and selling power on a larger market that includes New Mexico, Arizona, Oregon, and Washington. This is concerning for a lot of reasons. Such a measure would expose California to federal administration (FERC) oversight (an administration that has already made steps to kill renewable energy), and distracts from Ava's focus on investing in a local clean energy economy.
If this bill passes in the Senate, this would be a huge blow to localized renewable clean energy. This bill cannot pass, and Ava should not be supporting it. Not only that, but this Action Item has not been brought to the Board before as an information item. Why is Ava pushing a vote on a serious, complex issue when there are a lot of new Board members, and when this is the first time the Board is seeing this item? At the very least, the Board deserves more time to consider this fully.
Please oppose support for SB 540 or delay the vote to allow the board more time to consider this important issue. We should not give up California control to a new entity that could be ultimately controlled by the Trump FERC.
Tom Kunhardt
Oakland CA
Sierra Club Energy Committee
415-306-1243