California’s two biggest utility companies want to
help farmers ditch their polluting diesel pumps to comply with
air-quality crackdowns. In the process, the companies stand to gain
thousands of new customers.
In November, Pacific Gas and
Electric Company and Southern California Edison submitted a
proposal to the California Public Utilities Commission —
which authorizes all utility rate changes — to reduce
electricity rates by 20 percent for farmers who switch from
diesel-powered irrigation pumps to electric.
Currently,
about 5,700 diesel pumps bring water to crops in California’s
Central Valley. The exhaust contributes to one of the highest rates
of ozone pollution and asthma in the country, according to David
Pepper, a doctor with the Medical Alliance for Healthy Air.
An exemption for California’s farmers in the 1970 federal
Clean Air Act allowed them to operate dirty machines without the
air pollution permits required of other industries. But a state law
closed the loophole in 2003, and farmers now face costly equipment
upgrades to meet new standards (HCN, 10/13/03: Clearing the Air).
The utilities’ incentive program gives farmers a 20
percent discount on electricity the first year, then decreases the
discount by 1.5 percent each year for 10 years. Under the program,
a 100 horsepower pump running for 100 hours would use roughly $600
of electricity — about the same cost as burning diesel.
“It adds customer base,” says Jon Tremayne, a
spokesperson for Pacific Gas and Electric. “And it cleans the air.”
The state utilities commission could approve the
incentive program as early as this spring.
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline California’s farmers ditch dirty diesel pumps.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
