Millions of dollars that California's big three utilities collect from customers each month for energy conservation have been lost to waste, indecision and extra profits for the utilities, records and interviews show.
With little rigorous oversight by the state, much of that money has gone unspent. Even more of the $228 million earmarked annually for conservation has been used for programs that officials now admit were ineffective, if not misguided.
In fact, state figures show, less electricity is being saved today than five years ago.
The California Energy Commission estimates that if conservation programs had been run as effectively as they were in the early 1990s, the state would need 1,000 fewer megawatts the equivalent of two large power plants. That would have been enough to head off January's blackouts in the state.
Now California Gov. Gray Davis and the Legislature want to commit even more money in an 11th-hour bid to dodge outages this summer. Past performance is not inspiring confidence.
"We are glad that the state is looking seriously at energy efficiency," said Marcel Hawiger of The Utility Reform Network in San Francisco. But, he added, "we want to make sure that the programs will not continue the waste that we've seen in the past few years."
Since the mid-1970s, the utilities have taken a small bite out of each customer's bill to feed a state-mandated conservation fund that primarily provided rebates and vouchers to businesses and individuals who bought energy stingy appliances or undertook other power saving measures.
But five years ago, with chaos swirling around California's foray into deregulation, the program fell victim to neglect and a failed long-range strategy by the Public Utilities Commission, which wanted more money to promote and underwrite cutting edge conservation. PUC Commissioner Richard Bilas acknowledged that his panel did not stay on top of the problem.
He said policy-makers were so focused on bringing deregulation to California that issues involving the conservation money "sort of got dropped by the wayside."
"Now in retrospect," he said, "there is probably a tremendous loss to customers."
The state's utilities said they are proud of their contributions to conservation.
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