ReEnergize Texas has been a proud partner of the EnergÍa MÍa coalition in San Antonio working to expose misinformation regarding the city’s investment in a nuclear plant expansion known as South Texas Project 3&4.

The municipal utility, CPS Energy, spent the summer of 2009 telling the public and the City Council that expanding this nuclear facility represented the cheapest cleanest energy alternative for San Antonio. But they were wrong, and it turns out, they were lying. The price CPS officials quoted for this project was only $13 billion, when the builder (Toshiba) had already told CPS and its partner NRG Energy that the price was more likely to be $17 billion.

EnergÍa MÍa organizers challenged CPS to prove its numbers, argued that the nuclear price estimate was too low, and argued that cost projections for renewable alternatives were too high. We organized public comments and protest events which delayed the City Council vote on a $400 million package that would have helped STP 3&4 move forward.

In late October, just days before the long-delayed City Council vote, Mayor Julian Castro learned of the higher cost figure. He and the City Council postponed the vote until 2010 while CPS went under investigation for withholding information. As a direct result, CPS General Manager Steve Bartley was forced to resign and several other executives were forced to resign, were suspended, or were demoted.

The process of changing the leadership at CPS continues, as does the struggle for the future of energy in San Antonio. ReEnergize Texas and the EnergÍa MÍa coalition are calling San Antonio’s Mayor and City Council to refuse any additional money until:

• CPS is completely out of the STP 3&4 expansion
• The CPS Energy Board has been cleaned up
• There is an independent external investigation and audit of CPS Energy
• Accountability and reporting mechanisms for the money are made clear

We believe in alternatives that will help reduce carbon emissions NOW, create green jobs and grow the local economy NOW, and that will make San Antonio a clean energy leader NOW. The city should embrace a public process for making its ongoing energy decisions in the same way that Austin has done. We believe that such a process would result in a more energy efficiency, investment in job-creating technologies like solar and geothermal, lower overall bills and forge a stronger partnership between city and utility leaders and the people they are picked to represent.