Conservation Groups Want More Public Discussions on Sunrise Powerlink

By Ed Joyce / Reporter, KPBS Public Broadcasting

Published October 16, 2006 at 12:06 PM PDT

This story was published more than 18 years ago.

Conservation groups want more public meetings to talk about the proposed Sunrise Powerlink transmission line project. The Powerlink is a 150-mile transmission line. San Diego Gas and Electric says the

Conservation groups want more public meetings to talk about the proposed Sunrise Powerlink transmission line project. The Powerlink is a 150-mile transmission line. San Diego Gas and Electric says the line is needed to feed the region’s electricity needs in the next decade. KPBS Reporter Ed Joyce has details.

The San Diego Chapter of the Sierra Club and the Center for Biological Diversity want the state Public Utilities Commission to extend the comment period for the Sunrise Powerlink project. Sierra Club spokeswoman Kelly Fuller says more meetings are needed because of a recent SDG&E filing with the PUC.

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Fuller: This project could now potentially be routed in areas that did not know that they might have the Powerlink coming through them. And so we have asked for additional scoping meetings.

SDG&E spokeswoman Stephanie Donovan says the recent filing was requested by the PUC and included routes the utility had considered and rejected. She says the utility’s preferred route takes the power lines across more than 20 miles of Anza-Borrego Desert State Park - and the utility has not proposed any other routes. Ed Joyce, KPBS News.

Ed Joyce

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Ed Joyce was the environment reporter and afternoon news anchor for KPBS-FM. Before joining KPBS, he worked as an editor/columnist with Copley News Service in San Diego. Ed has an extensive background in newspaper, radio, web and TV journalism. After graduating with a B.A. in Communications from the University of Washington in Seattle, Ed began a career in broadcast journalism. His work has included stints in public broadcasting, commercial broadcasting and education -- working as an affiliate professor of communication and reporter at the University of Idaho and Washington State University in Pullman, Wash. During the past 20 years he has worked in radio, TV and print as a news reporter, anchor, writer, editor and producer. Along the way he has won numerous awards for general news reporting, newswriting, feature and issue reporting and breaking news reporting from The Associated Press, The Society of Professional Journalists, San Diego Press Club and other organizations. During the mid-1990s, while working for Oregon Public Broadcasting, he was a frequent contributor to National Public Radio, including a feature report on the memorial service for 14 U.S. Forest Service "hotshots" who died fighting a wildfire in Colorado (the crew was based in a central Oregon town). He’s also filed reports with Marketplace, KQED’s California Report and Climate Watch and with national and regional networks throughout the United States. At KPBS, Ed continues his contributions to National Public Radio and other national and regional news organizations. He has won awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and San Diego Press Club for his environmental reporting at KPBS-FM-TV and for producing and anchoring radio newscasts. In 2007 he was selected a National Press Foundation fellow for Understanding Violent Weather II program. The seminars were held at the National Weather Center in Norman, Okla. In 2008 he spoke at a UC San Diego conference on U.S. National Security as part of the school’s Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation. Ed led a discussion with the 18 foreign government officials and academics about the political debate over climate change. In 2010, Ed was elected to a three-year term on the board of the San Diego Press Club.

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