Davis speeds plant construction as judge extends power supply order

U.S. District Judge Frank Damrell Jr.'s extension of his Tuesday temporary restraining order ensures three key suppliers will not pull about 4,000 megawatts off the state's power grid. That's enough power for roughly 4 million homes.

"The state of California is confronting an energy crisis of catastrophic proportions," the judge wrote. The loss of the power they provide "poses an imminent threat of blackouts."

The grid's manager, the California Independent System Operator, sought the order, warning that the electricity's removal would disrupt the region's power supply so severely that outages would spread beyond California.

"This would be a serious impact on the safety, health and welfare of not only Californians, but everyone in the Western U.S.," said Jim Detmers, the ISO's managing director of operations.

The order, in effect at least until a Feb. 16 hearing on the case, names Reliant Energy Services Inc., AES Pacific Inc. and Dynegy Power Corp.

Reliant had been under a temporary restraining order issued by the Sacramento judge Tuesday night, shortly before the midnight expiration of a Bush administration directive requiring suppliers to continue selling to California despite utility solvency concerns.

Davis, looking ahead to a summer energy crunch expected to be even worse than the winter's, issued an executive order he said will add enough electricity for 5 million homes by July.

The state will provide $30 million in bonuses and speed up the approval process for small natural gas or renewable-fuel power plants that run only during peak hours of the day, if those facilities will be operating by summer, Davis said.

The governor asked President Bush to direct federal agencies to also issue permits for small plants within the same time frame.<