POWER CUSTOMERS GET CHANCE TO HELP SAVE ENVIRONMENT : CONSUMERS WILL BE ABLE TO CHOOSE UTILITIES THAT UTILIZE CLEANER SOURCES.

Byline: V. John White

THE stunning defeat of Southern California Edison Co. before the California Coastal Commission is a major victory for environmentalists who have been struggling to protect the environment and promote cleaner power sources in the midst of the electricity deregulation debate.

After months of political wrangling, the Coastal Commission voted unanimously to force Edison to live up to promises it made back in 1991 to compensate for the damage to coastal ecosystems from the operation of the San Onofre nuclear reactor, which sits along the coast near the border of San Diego and Orange counties.

The vote was especially significant because it overturned a last-minute deal the commission staff had negotiated with Edison's CEO, John Bryson, and because it showed the impact of state Assembly Speaker Cruz Bustamante's new appointees. The Coastal Commission now has the strongest pro-environment majority since 1981.

Edison, wrapping itself in the rhetoric of competition, had argued that it should only spend one-third of the $113 million previously earmarked for marine mitigation.

Democratic and Republican commission members alike were not convinced by the utility's arguments, especially after the Sierra Club and others pointed out that Edison already had been guaranteed the mitigation money as part of the ``stranded cost'' bailout of utilities' nuclear investments in last year's electric restructuring legislation.

The opportunity customers will soon have to choose where to send their electricity dollars may soon cause Edison and other utilities to rethink their heavy-handed political tactics and their refusal to make new statements in renewable energy sources.

One of the reasons many environmentalists have come around to supporting competition in the electric services industry is because we think giving customers the choice to go green could break the stalemate on reducing the environmental harm caused by electric power generation.

If utilities and their regulators don't screw it up, electric industry restructuring and competition will empower consumers to reward companies selling power from wind, solar, geothermal and clean-burning natural gas, offsetting the cost advantage currently enjoyed by dirty coal plants and subsidized nuclear units.

Under the current monopoly system, customers can only buy what the utility offers. Yet, polling data collected in California and throughout the country suggest that a sizable number of consumers would rather buy from cleaner, renewable sources of power such as solar, wind and geothermal steam technologies.

Starting Jan. 1, 1998, utility customers in California will finally have that choice. For the first time, consumers will be able to decide for themselves if they want electricity generated from power plants that pollute the environment or if they want it from clean, renewable sources. Since conventional, fossil-fuel power plants represent the largest source of air pollution in the United States, choosing clean power presents consumers with an unprecedented opportunity to stop paying for sources that dirty the air. Consumers can also elect not to buy from highly subsidized nuclear power plants such as San Onofre.

Though some environmentalists are wary of moving into a market where outcomes are uncertain, I believe the sleeping giant of restructuring is a tremendous pent-up demand for clean power. For example, at a recent Eco Expo event held in Los Angeles, one of the most popular activities was for attendees to sign pledges to buy clean power offers.

Electric restructuring allows consumers to vote with their electricity dollars. There is no doubt that obstacles to this seemingly simple scenario remain. The vociferous attempts by Edison to stave off competition within its own service territory suggest (like the old Soviet Union in the transition from communism to democracy) that the word ``competition'' may be more prevalent than the reality.

California's policy-makers have done much to assure that utility shareholders recover investments in old power plants like San Onofre, and that large industrial customers have direct access to alternative electricity providers.

Yet, achieving these outcomes does nothing to ensure that California's experiment in deregulation actually results in lower rates or cleaner power customer portfolios. Nor does it benefit small commercial and residential consumers or harness public support for clean power to build viable, customer-based green markets.

Despite these reservations, I and many of my friends in the environmental community chose to move forward with market-oriented electricity reforms sooner rather than later.

We believe the chance to choose offers more opportunity than propping up the status quo. The Legislature granted the right for consumers to pick power suppliers.

It is the job of environmentalists and consumer advocates, working with agents of federal, state and local governments, to make sure the means to choose translates into real environmental gains.

If de facto deregulation substitutes for robust competition, consumers and the environment are on the menu instead of at the table. We have chosen to confront the devil and his friends - the small details of restructuring - at the crossroads between the land of utility monopolies and that of open competition.

I believe customers will, like the Coastal Commission, want power providers to live up to their promises. They will also vote for clean over nuclear power.