Hayward and Calpine will get first plant with Greenhouse Gas limit

Hayward, California and Calpine will have the first the plant with a Greenhouse Gas limit, ending years of talks, battles, and controversy. The Bay Area Air Quality Management District approved a "Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) permit" which is the final federal regulatory approval needed for the Calpine energy plant to be built.

"Once again California is demonstrating leadership on greenhouse gas related issues. We applaud the BAAQMD and Calpine for going beyond existing federal law and being the first in the nation to require an enforceable greenhouse gas limit," said Linda Adams, California State Secretary for Environmental Protection. "This action furthers efforts at a statewide level to balance our economic needs while meeting our environmental challenges. Aggressive and early action like this is needed to fight global warming and is critical to our economic recovery."

Hayward, California will get a new energy plant that will result in 650 union construction jobs, a number of part-time and permanent jobs, and an estimated $30 million in one-time tax revenue and $5 million annually in property tax revenue.

This is a project I've long advocated for because we have never seen a plant that was created from the start with a Federal Greenhouse Gas Limit. The Calpine Russell City Energy Center will be a supplier of energy and jobs to the San Francisco Bay Area.

The approval ends a process that saw the California Energy Commission grant a license for the plant in September 2007, California Public Utilities Commission approval of a 10-year power purchase agreement in April 2009 under which PG&E will purchase the electricity generated by the plant, and a major public hearing on the plan on September 2, 2009:



But what's more, the natural gas powered plant will reportedly use 100 percent reclaimed water from the City of Hayward’s Water Pollution Control Facility for cooling and boiler makeup. The process conserves water and prevents nearly four million gallons of wastewater per day from being dumped into San Francisco Bay.

It's also a process that was first used on a major scale at Walt Disney World in Florida, when its power plant systems were built.

Calpine reports that Russell City Energy Center also will donate $10 million to help build a new library for Hayward.

Stay tuned.