Investor-owned utilities make money by justifying capital investments in infrastructure that are paid for by their customers, and which then earn the utilities guaranteed rates of return as high as 9%. In years when interest rates are high, the returns can be double-digit. A captive customer base pays for nearly everything, even when things break down.

One recent example: A leak discovered at San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station in January 2012 has kept the plant offline for eighteen months. Last week, Southern California Edison finally made the decision to shut down the plant only after the Nuclear Regulatory Commission shot holes in their plans to re-open it. Meanwhile, ratepayers have been charged nearly $1 billion for a plant that was producing no power.

It’s an arrangement most businesses can only dream of. The utilities are incentivized to keep building forever because they’ll keep earning a guaranteed return on whatever they build. But what’s the incentive for the people they serve?

Perhaps it’s time for California to take a page from Hawaii’s playbook. An article published last week in Hawaii’s largest newspaper, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, reported that the state’s Public Utilities Commission reduced the allowable profit for Maui Electric Company (MECO) from 10% to 9%.

As one of the commissioners phrased it, “attractive financial returns are not a utility entitlement. Instead, excellent utility performance with affordable rates and superior customer service should drive utility financial performance.” What a concept!

Back here on the mainland, the Associated Press reported that a recent audit of PG&E following the 2010 San Bruno gas pipeline explosion uncovered a 12.7 percent average rate of return for the utility’s gas distribution operations from 2003 to 2010. During that same timeframe, PG&E’s authorized rate averaged 11.3 percent.

California regulators should follow Hawaii’s lead and tell our investor-owned utilities that they have to earn their profits through superior customer service and performance, including safety standards.

The Star-Advertiser article goes on to point out that Hawaii’s utilities lack a “strategic and sustainable business model to address technological changes and increasing customer expectations.” Sounds like a familiar story in California, and it could have detrimental effects on the utilities’ public image.

When California utilities resist innovation and advancement – for example, by trying to stop rooftop solar and end net metering – they seem more and more like a landline in the age of smart phones, or the newspaper industry ignoring the possibilities of the Internet. It’s anti-progress; and when we’re talking dirty energy versus clean, it’s also anti-public health.

We can only hope Hawaii’s stance that utility returns are not an entitlement will have a bit of influence on the Golden State.

At a time when most major corporations are seeking sensible ways to reduce their carbon footprint and make their business operations more efficient, it’s disappointing to see one of the world’s leading airlines fighting efforts in the U.S. and globally to take meaningful action to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from air travel.

Aviation’s global carbon footprint is large and growing rapidly. The sector would be the 7th largest emitter of GHGs in the world if it were a country. With more people flying every year, airplane pollution is expected to double by 2020 and quadruple by 2050 without control measures being put in place.

Unfortunately, United Airlines is leading the U.S. aviation industry in opposing multiple efforts to curb GHG emissions, at home and abroad. In California, United has taken its opposition even further by playing a leadership role in “Fueling California,” an organization focused on dismantling California’s clean fuel standard (known as the Low Carbon Fuel Standard, or LCFS). The LCFS is a critical component of the state’s landmark clean energy and climate law, AB 32.

Fueling California is led by President and CEO Bob Sturtz, who joined the board when he was United’s Managing Director of Strategic Sourcing. Serving alongside Sturtz on the Board of Directors is Melinda Yee Franklin, Director of Corporate and Government Affairs for United’s western region.

In a media teleconference today, top-level United Airlines frequent flyers – including California philanthropist and Prop 39 author Tom Steyer – urged the airline to stop working to block standards to reduce pollution from vehicles and aircraft and instead encourage cleaner transportation fuels and smart market-based climate policies. As a member of United’s invitation-only “Global Services” program, Steyer is among the airline’s most important customers.

Steyer called on United to withdraw its affiliation with Fueling California. In a statement put out today by the national “Flying Clean” campaign, Steyer said:

“In my home state of California, United is playing a leadership role in trying to get rid of our clean fuel standard, which doesn’t even cover airlines. If United wants to stay competitive, it needs to take climate change seriously and act in its customers’ –and the planet’s – best interest,” said Tom Steyer, former investment manager, energy activist, and United Global Services member. “It’s time to recognize that the friendly skies will get a whole lot un-friendlier if we don’t take action on climate change.”

In the teleconference, Steyer and other representatives from United’s elite frequent flyer programs released a letter urging the company to take a stand on climate change. Joined by thousands of frequent and everyday flyers who signed an online petition, the message comes on the eve of a meeting of the international group working to set a standard for global aviation pollution, and two days before United’s annual shareholder meeting.

United’s business class and super frequent flyers represent only 5 percent of ticket sales but generate 50-75 percent of total profits, making them the airline’s most prized and influential customers.

The California Business Alliance for a Green Economy joins with Tom Steyer in calling on United to start flying straight when it comes to support for clean energy policies in California and internationally.

http://www.ca-greenbusinessalliance.com/get-on-board-with-clean-energy-climate-action/

On Sunday the Sacramento Bee editorial page ran a column I wrote outlining the many problems with Republican political consultant Dan Schnur's proposal to ban campaign fundraising during the Legislative session. You can read the entire piece here:

http://www.sacbee.com/2013/06/09/5480562/fundraising-ban-would-be-gimmick.html

In a nutshell...while the idea sounds fine on the surface, its unworkable and decidedly unfair. It gives challengers a huge advantage by allowing them to raise unlimited funds while incumbents are handcuffed. And it will lead to more money being funneled into independent expenditure committees

Let's hope the frenzy in the Capitol right now doesn't lead to the swift enactment of gimmicks that might undermine sincere efforts for public financing of campaigns, the only real reform that makes sense.

Recently, California’s investor-owned utilities have been having a little trouble getting their stories straight on the impact of California’s “net metering” policy. Gary Stern of Southern California Edison acknowledged in US News and World Report that expansion of distributed solar generation results in “less need for new transmission lines.” Meanwhile, David Rubin of PG&E told KQED that “solar customers really use the grid more intensively than non-solar customers.” Only one of them can be right, so which is it?

Well, a study conducted earlier this year by Crossborder Energy found that net metering will deliver more than $92 million in benefits per year to California ratepayers. Major utilities in California — and across the United States — have been trying to eliminate net metering in order to protect their monopoly business models, which rely on ratepayers connecting to a centralized grid. But with popularity of rooftop solar at an all-time high, these utilities also recognize the need to appear supportive of solar with the public. Hence the contradictory statements from Stern and Rubin. What they know behind the scenes – that rooftop solar eliminates the need for investments such as transmission and distribution – is starting to seep into their public discourse.

But the benefits of net metering and rooftop solar go far beyond simply saving consumers money. These and other renewable energy options also have a significant impact on our health, environment, and economy. That’s why the co-Chair of Californians Against Utilities Stopping Solar Energy (CAUSE) has joined with the American Lung Association, Presente.org, California Environmental Justice Alliance (CEJA), and other leading public health, clean air, environmental justice, and solar industry groups to petition the California Energy Commission (CEC) to conduct a study of these impacts.

This study cannot come soon enough for Dr. Luis Pacheco, Medical Director of the Transitional Care Unit at California Hospital Medical Center and CAUSE Co-Chair. “By driving the expansion of rooftop solar, net metering helps improve the quality of the air we breathe while creating jobs in our communities,” Pacheco said. “These were key considerations when net metering was adopted, and should be included in an assessment of the policy’s overall effectiveness.”

Whether or not the CEC agrees with Pacheco and his co-signers has yet to be seen.

Blasting it as "Republican-inspired," Rep. Jared Huffman is rebuffing what he calls a "political witch hunt to embarrass the administration" over the attempt to break the agreement that was made to close the Drakes Bay Oyster Farm in the Point Reyes National Seashore when its lease expired.

According to a news report in the Santa Rosa Press Democrat today, "Rep. Jared Huffman said Wednesday he is rejecting the city of Sonoma’s request that he support a congressional investigation," noting that the council's resolution seemed to presume” there was a “clear-cut case of scientific misconduct."

Huffman, D-San Rafael, whose district includes the Drakes Bay Oyster Co. near Inverness but not the town of Sonoma, challenged three of the assumptions contained in a resolution adopted Monday night that supports the oyster farm.

The resolution “seemed to presume” there was a “clear-cut case of scientific misconduct,” Huffman said, involved in former Interior Secretary Ken Salazar’s decision in November not to renew the permit for the farm that harvests $1.5 million worth of oysters a year from Drakes Estero.

Says the news article, '"Finally, Huffman said, the allegations of faulty science — included in the Sonoma resolution and repeatedly raised in Lunny’s legal arguments — incorrectly assert that the science informed Salazar’s decision. Salazar “clearly stated” that his decision was “based on law and policy,” not the disputed scientific assessments of the oyster farm’s impact on the estero, a 2,500-acre federally protected waterway, Huffman said.'"

The article also noted: "'Sonoma’s resolution also asked state Assemblyman Marc Levine, D-San Rafael, to back the oyster farm’s claim that it still holds fishing rights granted by the state. Levine said he would not get involved in a case that is in the courts."

You can read the full article here: http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20130605/ARTICLES/130609748/1033/news?Title=Huffman-won-t-back-Sonoma-s-call-to-investigate-oyster-farm-closure

In a PR stunt masterminded by their new "crisis communications" guru, the Drakes Bay Oyster Company last week announced that they had cut ties to Cause of Action, the right-wing legal team linked to billionaire oil kingpins, the Koch Brothers. The group had provided them to what one report called "hundreds of thousands of dollars" of pro bono legal help.

But that, according to a news report out today, is just the tip of the iceberg, since neither the Company nor Cause of Action will fully disclose their donors.

In today's East Bay Express, http://www.eastbayexpress.com/oakland/drakes-bay-oyster-company-still-has-ties-with-koch-brothers-linked-groups/Content?oid=3568987, reporter Robert Gammon details more ties with conservative legal and advocacy groups, as well as right-wing politicians.

Here's an excerpt from the report:

"Yet even though Cause of Action is no longer playing a role in the oyster farm's legal battle with the US Department of the Interior, other Koch Brothers-linked groups are still involved in the fight and have rallied to the oyster farm's cause. The Pacific Legal Foundation, a California-based conservative group that has received funding from the Koch Brothers, has publicly declared that it intends to help the oyster farm in its attempt to remain open at Point Reyes National Seashore.

In addition, Americans for Prosperity (AFP) — a group that was founded by the Koch Brothers, has been a been a major funder of the Tea Party, and spent untold millions last year attempting to defeat President Obama — produced a video earlier this year championing the oyster farm's efforts. In the video, AFP portrayed then-US Secretary Ken Salazar's decision last November to allow the oyster farm's lease to expire at Point Reyes as a "federal land grab" — even though the farm operates on public land and had been told repeatedly that its lease would not be renewed."

As Gammon notes: "How long will liberal foodies and environmentalists keep their heads in the sand and keep supporting the oyster farm's efforts?"

Apparently as long as Koch Brothers-funded efforts to distort the truth continue.

Victory has a thousand fathers, and heavens knows that there are plenty of folks trying to take credit for causing the come-from-behind results that will result in a runoff for the Senate seat vacated by Democrat Michael Rubio between Democrat Leticia Perez and Republican Andy Vidak. But there appears to be reason to believe that the "Californians for Good Schools and Good Jobs," the business, labor, and tribal IE under the leadership of Mark Weideman and David Quintana might have been a major contributor to the lopsided margin racked up by Perez in provision ballots.

In the final six weeks of the campaign, the IE focused on a major field effort http://bakersfield.craigslist.org/npo/3790749570.html targeting Latino Democrats and DTS voters. That included six weeks of phone calling by up to 16 bilingual staffers, four mail pieces aimed at Latino voters, a GOTV program with 100 bilingual staff in 35 communities, and 43 bilingual field canvassers.

As we all know, Vidak declared victory on election night (along with Sen. Bob Huff in a self-congratulating email the next day). But provisional and late vote by mail ballots, which broke 62-32 for Perez, is what eventually forced the runoff. In comparison, Perez won 41.7 percent of the votes cast on election day.

In a show of desperation and political convenience, Paul Leon, the Republican who placed second to now-Senator Norma Torres in May has changed his political stripes and has filed to run for the seat vacated by Torres in the 52nd Assembly District (eastern LA County, western San Bernadino County) by re-registering as "decline to state."

The Inland Valley Daily Bulletin http://www.dailybulletin.com/news/ci_23373733/nine-candidates-seek-replace-torres-assembly#ixzz2VHuSrwJ2 reports:

"Leon, whose campaign priorities included supporting local control of L.A./Ontario International Airport and diverting state spending from High Speed Rail to keeping offenders in prison, ran as a Republican in that race but on Friday dropped the GOP mantle.

"We need to stop focusing so much on who's from what political party and instead focus on the issues candidates stand for. By registering as a DTS (decline to state), voters can now look at my plan to increase jobs, fund our schools, continue the Gold Line light rail to the Ontario Airport and fight hard for local control of Ontario airport," Leon wrote in an email.

The district has a 47-27 Democratic registration advantage, which pretty much says all you need to know about why Leon is trying to shed his Republican credentials.

Good luck with that.

Supporters of the Interior Department’s decision to protect the Point Reyes National Seashore’s ecological heart, Drakes Estero, as the West Coast’s first marine wilderness area today charged that opponents of the Obama Administration’s decision presented “inaccurate and misleading” information to the Sonoma City Council to win approval of a resolution riddled with factual inaccuracies that run counter to established state and federal law.

This resolution is a work of fiction. It disregards well-established federal and state law and policy, as well as the expert scientific conclusions that Drakes Estero marine wilderness area is much better off without commercial oyster operations. We trust our state and federal legislators from this region will protect the public interest from right-wing-funded attacks based on cherry-picked information.

The resolution asks Assemblyman Marc Levine (D-San Rafael) and Congressman Jared Huffman (D-San Rafael) to intervene on behalf of the Drakes Bay Oyster Company in direct conflict with the well-established legal opinions of state agencies. “Drakes Bay Oyster Company’s relentless pursuit to privatize Drakes Estero while conveniently ignoring its expired lease contract and policy, National Park Service Management Policies, and the California Coastal Act, is undeniably part of a larger right-wing campaign to open our most protected and treasured public lands to commercial exploitation.

The Drakes Bay Oyster Company’s partners to exploit protected public lands include Koch Brothers-funded organizations Americans For Prosperity and the Pacific Legal Foundation, pro-Keystone Pipeline Senator David Vitter (R-LA), and arch-conservative chair of the House Natural Resources Committee Congressman Doc Hastings (R-WA). Drakes Bay Oyster Company and the conservative legal group Cause of Action, which provided pro bono legal services, continue to refuse to reveal the funders of their legal and PR efforts.

The State of California and Congressman Huffman have already rejected the intended goals of last night’s resolution. Congressman Huffman, one of six California Democrats on the House Natural Resources Committee, previously stated that Rep. Hastings’ engagement in the oyster company case was “a political witch-hunt to embarrass the administration,” and that, “if the GOP leadership is interested in science this would be a first.” The California Fish & Game Commission’s attorney has stated that the, "Drakes Bay leases were contingent on continuing approval by the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) of a right of the company to operate on land at the shore of the Estero. That permission having been withdrawn by DOI, the leases no longer are valid and cannot be relied upon by the Company as authority to operate their aquaculture endeavor in the Estero."

The Sonoma City Council completely disregarded the company’s repeated violations of the Coastal Act and multiple cease and desist orders issued for its unlawful behavior, including the thousands of pieces of the company’s plastic pollution collected all over the Point Reyes National Seashore, in calling the company “sustainable.” The resolution also claims that the Drakes Bay Oyster Company produces 40% of California’s oysters, a falsehood repeatedly perpetuated by the company. Industry data shows that the company produces less than 20% of California’s oysters, and less than 4% of West Coast oysters.