Those of us opposed to The City’s planned combustion turbine power plant project in southeastern San Francisco were nonetheless enthused to learn that Mayor Gavin Newsom has reached an agreement with Mirant Corp. whereby Mirant will shut its Potrero power plant if and when it loses its “must-run” contract with the state. We were even more delighted to learn the following piece of good news:

The City does not have to build any combustion turbine power plants.

That is because by The City pledging in its agreement not to oppose Mirant’s renewal of its water permit for Potrero’s gas boiler Unit 3, which produces emissions at the same level as a single city-owned combustion turbine, Mirant Unit 3 will run until the end of 2010.

Advocates of The City’s fossil-fuel-burning power plants might ask: But we want to shut down the Potrero plant, right? Not exactly. We first want to shut down Potrero units 4, 5 and 6, which are its filthy diesel turbine “peakers.” And The City does not even need to build its proposed combustion turbines to close the diesel units.

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A December 2006 change to the Bay Area Air Quality Management District’s gas turbine regulations means that, thanks to regulators, the diesel turbines have been deemed too dirty to operate, and must not run past 2009, according to BAAQMD air quality engineering manager Barry Young. This fact was undiscovered, or ignored, by the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission staff in an effort to paint the gloomiest doomsday scenario possible about the operation of the Potrero power plant into 2010 and beyond.

In actuality, Potrero Unit 3 and The City’s combustion turbines produce emissions at a level “of similar health concern,” according to the BAAQMD’s Young. With the diesels gone and Unit 3 able to run until the end of 2010 with no loss to the community versus the equally-emitting combustion turbines, The City now has time to build a green alternative that will satisfy the concern of the California Independent System Operator that the 400 megawatts the Trans Bay Cable will bring us in early 2010 are still not enough to cover “peaks” in electricity usage.

I was at a recent Southeast Community Health town hall meeting and asked those present whether they would prefer Potrero, without the diesel turbines, running another year were The City to reject the combustion turbines, in order to receive no power plants in the neighborhood forever. Nondiesel Potrero won in a landslide.

Therefore, as long as an alternative is in sight from its crow’s nest, the Board of Supervisors should not hesitate to reject outright The City’s proposed contract with J-Power when it has the chance to cast a final vote on the $230 million combustion turbine power plant project.

The Board of Supervisors has the opportunity to fashion its alternative before the vote and finalize it for presentation to CAISO in the aftermath of its rejection of the combustion turbines. Many of us dream of seeing The City outfit southeastern San Francisco with solar facilities, installed by men and women from the Bayview and Potrero Hill trained to excel in green-collar jobs, instead of watching San Francisco erect the last fossil-fuel-burning power plant it will ever build.

The mayor could even pre-emptively embrace this vision and demonstrate that San Francisco is at last ready to lay claim to being the leader in building green-energy generation and addressing climate change that we know he wants our city to be.

Joshua Arce is the executive director and a staff attorney for the Brightline Defense Project.