Coastal resources: once-through cooling.

(1) Under the Warren-Alquist State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Act, the State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Commission (energy commission) has the exclusive authority to certify a site for the construction of a new thermal powerplant or the modification of an existing thermal powerplant and related facilities. The California Coastal Act of 1976 provides for the planning and regulation of development, under a coastal development permit process, within the coastal zone, as defined. The act regulates various types of developments within the coastal zone, including industrial developments and thermal electric generating plants. This bill would prohibit a state agency, as defined, from authorizing, approving, or certifying a new powerplant or industrial facility, as defined, that uses once-through cooling, as defined. The bill would require the State Water Resources Control Board (state board) to adopt and implement a statewide policy on once-through cooling at coastal and estuarine powerplants. The bill would also require each regional water board to review and issue a powerplant's national pollutant discharge elimination system (NPDES) permit for its once-through cooling system within 6 months of the expiration of that permit. (2) Under existing law, the state board and the 9 California regional water quality control boards regulate water quality in accordance with the Porter-Cologne Water Quality Control Act (act) and the federal Clean Water Act. Under the act, the state board is required to adopt specified state policies with respect to water quality as it relates to the coastal marine environment, including a policy requiring coastal powerplants and other industrial installations using seawater for cooling, heating, or industrial processing to use the best available site, design, technology, and mitigation measures feasible to minimize the intake and mortality of all forms of marine life. Existing law establishes the State Coastal Conservancy in the Natural Resources Agency and authorizes the conservancy to acquire, manage, direct the management of, and conserve specified coastal lands and wetlands in the state. Existing law establishes the Coastal Trust Fund (fund) in the State Treasury to receive and disburse funds paid to the conservancy in trust. Existing law authorizes the conservancy to expend the moneys in the fund for purposes of the San Francisco Bay Area Conservancy Program and for other specified purposes. This bill would require a powerplant that uses once-through cooling, as defined, to pay a specified fee. The bill would require the state board to collect the fee and to deposit the revenues from the fee in the Marine Life Restoration Account, which the bill would establish in the fund. The bill would require the conservancy to administer the account and would authorize money in the account to be expended, only upon appropriation by the Legislature, by the conservancy and the state board to reimburse their costs of administering the fee, by the conservancy for specified projects and activities that address the impacts of once-through cooling processes, and by the state board to provide grants to powerplants currently using once-through cooling, as specified.