Poseidon ups offer to city

In bid to convince council, company officials say they will provide discounted water to Huntington.Poseidon is offering Huntington Beach a discounted water supply in hopes of securing approval for its desalination facility at Monday’s meeting.

Officials with the Connecticut-based company said they’re prepared to sell Huntington Beach three million gallons of water per day at a rate 5% cheaper than it currently pays the Municipal Water District of Orange County if the city gives it a conditional use permit to build a $250-million desalination plant behind the AES power plant at Newland Avenue and Pacific Coast Highway.

A coalition of environmentalists and residents living near the site of the proposed plant are planning their own campaign to stop the facility. Anti-Poseidon activist Eileen Murphy said her group has narrowed its strategy to lobbying key council members.

It’s anyone’s guess who will emerge a victor in the closely watched environmental battle many say will have implications for dozens of other desalination facilities planned for the California coast. The council narrowly certified the group’s environmental impact report at its Sept. 7 meeting and will be asked Monday to determine whether the benefits of the project outweigh the concerns.

Since the project’s inception, Poseidon officials have argued that desalinated water is crucial to the growth of Orange County. On Friday they rolled out a plan to supply about 10% of the city’s water at a slight discount for the next 30 years, perhaps defusing activists’ arguments that the plant’s water wouldn’t go to Huntington Beach.

“It would provide a nominal benefit, but certainly nothing significant,” Public Works Director Bob Beardsly said, adding the proposal is only an offer and would have to be negotiated with the council.

“It adds another dimension to our water portfolio,” he said.

Poseidon Vice-President Billy Owens said the water would protect against possible long-term disruptions to the water supply. If the municipal water district decides to cut back imports to Huntington Beach in a dry year, Poseidon water will be available to meet demand.

“It should insulate them from any type of shortages at all,” he said.

That would mean Poseidon would be selling the city water at about half of what it costs to produce, Metropolitan Water District Official Wes Bannister said.

“Sounds like a good deal to me, but I question some of the numbers,” he said.

Poseidon is also offering to supply the city an emergency water supply of up to 10 million gallons of water per day for seven days in the event of a catastrophic incident like an earthquake or flood.

“Where pipes are broken and normal water supplies can’t be transmitted through, we would be able to deliver water into the system,” Owens said. “At a minimum it would protect downtown Huntington Beach and the southeast neighborhoods from water disruptions.”

Beardsly also said there was some talk about utilizing Poseidon technology to help pump water out of a proposed city reservoir near Poseidon; that might save the city about $1.5 million in infrastructure costs.

Owens said his group is preparing to negotiate the taxes the city would receive from the proposal.

“There is also legal protection if there is a change of ownership,” he said. “The city would be assured that the benefits would continue with the property, regardless of who the owner is. The benefits are tied to the property, not Poseidon.”

Those benefits aren’t enough to sway residents like Murphy, who argue that Poseidon would be detrimental to residents living in the heavily industrialized southeast neighborhood.

Residents have already had to endure a massive pipeline project by the Orange County Sanitation District and shouldn’t have to endure another pipeline project to connect Poseidon with a regional water distribution system, she said.

Murphy added that many residents are concerned that a similar effort by Poseidon in Tampa Bay, Fla., never delivered the water it promised.

“We don’t think they should have approved the environmental impact report, but that’s a horse out of the barn,” she said.

Instead, her group will continue to lobby Don Hansen and Gil Coerper, council members she has identified as crucial swing votes.

“We only need one more vote to stop this thing,” she said.20051013he5092kfDON LEACH / INDEPENDENT(LA)The Poseidon desalination facility would be built behind this AES power plant in Huntington Beach.