Letter: Hermosa Should Oppose New Power Plant

Wake up, Hermosa Beach! Do you realize that AES has plans to locate their new Power Plant even closer to Hermosa than it is now? Do you know that Hermosa residents are going to be exposed to a massive increase in Nitrogen Oxide and Ammonia emissions as well as a 497 percent increase in particulate pollution if the new plant runs at just 25 percent capacity? Did you know that AES is submitting an application to run at 76 percent capacity, even though it has run at less than 5 percent capacity for many years now?

Other cities have formally opposed new power plants at their locations, and the California Energy Commission has listened to their concerns, and  in the vast majority of those cases, did not allow new power plants to be located where they were not wanted. What is Hermosa Beach doing? Howard Fishman has at least signed the No New Power Plant petition at www.nopowerplant.com, but the rest of the council has done absolutely nothing! They have not even formally opposed the new plant. It  wasn't long ago that Hermosa councilmembers Peter Tucker and Michael DiVirgilio stated that they would oppose the development of a new Power Plant in Redondo when they campaigned for reelection. Since then, I have seen no activity to protect our city from this imposing plant that will dangerously affect the health of our residents for decades to come. New power plant projects are never considered next to densely populated residential areas.  It is time to act, Hermosa!

John Wike
Hermosa Beach

Letters to the editor do not necessarily reflect the views of Hermosa Beach Patch. Letters must be less than 500 words and are subject to editing for space, spelling, punctuation and grammar. Also, anonymous letters will not be published, so remember to include your real name. You can email your letter to Hermosa Beach Patch associate local editor John Schreiber at john.schreiber@patch.com.