By HOWARD FINE Staff Reporter

When Redondo Beach gastropub co-owner Bobak Nayebdadash looks out his window at the massive aging AES Corp. power plant, he sees a blight on the local landscape that’s keeping customers away from his business. He wants the plant torn down and doesn’t want a new one built in its place.

So Nayebdadash, who co-owns Sophie’s Place Restaurant, is backing a drive to place an initiative on the March ballot that would ban any power plant or other industrial use on the property. The initiative would force all power generation on the site to shut down by 2020.

“If the power plant weren’t there, we’d have more customers,” he said.

But local ad agency owner Don Szerlip is opposed to the initiative. He believes it will make it more difficult to negotiate with AES over the future of the site.

Szerlip, who owns Adwerx Communications, wants to avoid lengthy and costly legal battles that would stall redevelopment plans for years.

“Right now, we lack something overall to stimulate people to be on the waterfront,” Szerlip said. “We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to revitalize this critical waterfront acreage and if this initiative passes, we could blow it.”

Nayebdadash and Szerlip represent opposing sides of the growing divide among Redondo Beach businesses over the initiative, which could determine the fate of the 50-acre AES power plant site.

On one side, some business owners have teamed with residents and members of slow-growth group Build a Better Redondo to propose a ban on power plants on the site. On the opposing side are other businesses and the Redondo Beach Chamber of Commerce, which are supporting AES as it plans a new power generating facility and determines the best approach for redevelopment of the site.

Aging plant

Southern California Edison – a unit of Rosemead-based Edison International – built the power plant in the late 1940s. After doubling the plant’s output to 1,300 megawatts over the following 20 years, Edison sold the plant to AES in 1997.

The plant, which burns natural gas, dominates the skyline on Redondo Beach’s north shore. It doesn’t operate continuously, but when it does run, plumes of black smoke sometimes rise from its tall smokestacks.

The plant also uses seawater as its primary coolant; under a state law that took effect in April, it must reduce its intake of seawater 93 percent by 2020.

Instead of modifying the existing plant to comply with the seawater reduction, AES has proposed tearing it down and building a smaller plant that uses air as coolant instead of seawater. At first, AES proposed a 600 megawatt plant. But after hearing residents’ concerns, the company settled on a smaller 489-megawatt facility on just 12 acres of the site. The new plant would be 30 percent more efficient than the existing one.

The remaining 38 acres could be turned into commercial development, parkland or any other use approved by the city.

“We wanted to right-size the project, taking into consideration the concerns of the community,” said Jennifer Didlo, project director for AES Southland, a division of AES Corp. in Arlington, Va.

Next month, AES intends to file an application for the new power plant with the California Energy Commission, which has jurisdiction over the site. The application process is expected to take about two years; if approved, AES plans to build the new plant by 2020. The new facility would continue to operate as the current one does now, only during periods of high demand or whenever else it’s needed to provide power to the grid. Lately, it’s been in use to help offset the power loss from the shutdown of the San Onofre nuclear power plant.

But critics say any power plant on the site would be a polluting eyesore. They are trying to qualify an initiative for the March municipal ballot that would prohibit any industrial use on the property, including a power plant. Furthermore, opponents believe that a vote of city residents would be powerful force to sway state energy commission members to reject the AES proposal. They need to present 6,000 valid signatures to the City Council by early fall to be in time for the March ballot.

So far, the council has split on a resolution opposing the AES proposal for the new plant.

Councilman Bill Brand, who co-authored the initiative, said he turned to the initiative process after the council failed to act to stop plans for the new plant.

“Having a new power plant there will continue to harm business,” he said.

But Councilman Steve Diels said the initiative will harm the city’s ability to reach a deal with AES for a reasonable development plan or to buy the property outright.

“It’s a backwards strategy that will end up leaving the old plant that no one likes in place,” he said.

Opposing marinas

The power plant faces King Harbor, which is home to several marinas. Kevin Ketchum is general manager of the Port Royal Marina, a 350-slip facility for recreational craft users. He believes the pollution and visual blight from the plant has prompted some potential customers to moor their boats at other marinas. He doesn’t believe a new plant will reduce pollution. And he doesn’t think that a nearby whale mural by Laguna Beach artist Robert Wyland helps make the area more attractive.

“They have tried to cover up the visual blight by painting whales on the wall, but it doesn’t really matter,” Ketchum said. “The plant is a big blight right across the street that is definitely not a plus for the marina. And I’m just as concerned about pollution from a new plant as I am about pollution from this one.”

Ketchum said he supports the initiative drive and wants to see a mix of open space and mixed-use development on the AES site instead of a power plant.

But at the Redondo Beach Marina next door, manager Leslie Page said she favors the smaller new plant that AES has proposed.

“The footprint of that plant would be so much smaller and the plant itself so much cleaner than the current one,” she said.

Page said she believes whatever development proposal emerges on the rest of the site will boost business at the marina.

“There’s so much that can be done with the remaining 38 acres; it’s an opportunity we can’t afford to pass up,” she said.

Even though some business leaders oppose the initiative, not all of them will sign on for plans for a new power plant. They are primarily concerned that forcing AES to abandon its power plant proposal would result in AES suing the city and tying up the site for years. That in turn would delay redevelopment.

One such business leader is Michael Jackson, vice president of Redondo Beach-based Dardanelle Group Inc., a construction contractor and financing consultant for transportation projects. Jackson is also in line to serve as president of the Redondo chamber next year.

“The question isn’t whether we want a power plant there, because in an ideal world, we probably wouldn’t,” Jackson said. “This is about making sure AES has an economic incentive to tear down the old plant and not walk away and leave us stuck with it or sue for years on end.”