In an apparent attempt to sidestep a new California law that effectively prohibits electricity purchases from conventional coal-fired power plants, the Utah-based Intermountain Power Agency pushed five southern California cities to renew long-term contracts before Jan. 1, when the law goes into effect.

One city bit: Burbank. But U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein last week objected to the move and the powerful California senator who sponsored the law set up a smackdown meeting in Sacramento Monday with the cities.

Chastened, Burbank did an about-face and with the other four cities, declined to renew their contracts at this time.

The Intermountain Power Agency in turn moved its signing deadline to 2023, leaving the Utah and California members to decide whether to pursue cleaner energy from the coal-fired Intermountain Power Plant in Delta.

The outcome is by no means clear, given political differences between the states and uncertain commercial feasibility of new clean-coal technology.

In any event, IPA officials say that if the California cities want changes, they will have to pay for them with new contracts.

Burbank Mayor Todd Campbell, a former policy analyst with the Natural Resources Defense Council and current public policy director for a clean energy company, suffered political embarrassment in the contract flap.

This week, he called for big changes for the Intermountain Power Project plant to curb the 15 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions it spews each year.

"We are considering actually tearing IPP down and building a cleaner plant," Campbell said. "This means not only clean air for Utah but a cleaner environment for the globe."

Campbell said he also hoped IPP's 70 acres in Delta could be the site of wind and solar farms. "We would like to accelerate renewable technology," he said.

The IPA board would consider the latter, said board member Gary Merrill, general manager of Murray City Power. But Campbell won't get all of his wishes. "It's not an option for the California participants to tear down the plant," Merrill said.

Power play: The Intermountain Power Agency in Delta is owned by 23 Utah cities. Thirty-six utilities, including six in southern California, have contracted to buy power.

The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power is entitled to about 45 percent of the power and the other five cities - Burbank, Pasadena, Glendale, Anaheim and Riverside - total about 30 percent.

But as a practical matter, Merrill said, the California cities use nearly all of the plant's electricity and therefore are supporting its debt service and its operations and maintenance.

Loans to build the $3.2 billion, 1,800 megawatt plant were based on long-term contracts signed up-front.

Those loans will be paid off in 2023; the contracts expire in 2027. In the meantime, the California cities will pressure the IPA board to move to cleaner power.

Merrill said he volunteered to work with the Californians as they pursue their goal.

But Reed Searle, IPP general manager, said he couldn't predict how the rest of the Utah IPA partners would respond.

"Most of the Utah utilities don't have such a strong interest in reducing greenhouse gas emissions," Searle said. They do, however, understand that their customers increasingly are concerned about global warming.

Merrill said a survey in his city last year showed nearly half of the respondents would be willing to pay more for alternative energy, with 10 percent willing to pay as much as 10 percent more.

Coal questioned: California Gov. Arnold Schwartzenegger on Sept. 29 signed the Greenhouse Gas Emissions Performance Standard Act, which excludes the kind of power now generated from pulverized coal plants in the West. Existing IPP contracts are exempt.

Jana Milford, a senior scientist with the Environmental Defense Fund, calculates California's share of IPP's carbon dioxide emissions will total 329 million tons between now and 2027. That's equivalent to carbon dioxide emissions from 2.6 million cars.

Because one intent of the new law is to stop exporting pollution, California officials and environmental groups were angry to hear of IPP's negotiations with the cities. V. John White, an activist with the Center for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Technologies, said his organization and the Utah and California chapters of the Sierra Club raised the alarm.

The Los Angeles Times earlier this month published an article citing Fred Fletcher, assistant general manager of the Burbank Department of Water and Power, who said extending its IPP contract through 2044 would save the city's power customers $300 million to $600 million.

That didn't wash with Feinstein. "Given Southern California's existing air quality problems, and the state's strong leadership role in combating climate change, I was both shocked and disappointed to learn of Burbank's decision" to extend its contract, she wrote to the Southern California Public Power Authority on Nov. 15.

Burbank officially will rescind its offer to renew the contract at a Dec. 5 City Council meeting, Fletcher said this past week.

"Now we understand a little better," Fletcher said. "If we have a project that will meet the California standard, we'll enter it."

Utah Sierra Club chapter spokesman Tim Wagner commended the turnaround. "These cities are clearly showing leadership in using their dollars to help address climate change," he said. "Utah can do the same, not only in how we buy our power but the type of power we support."

Wagner also pointed that conservation organizations' concerns have more weight since Tuesday, when the Utah Supreme Court gave them legal standing to challenge regulatory permits for coal-fired power plants.

Compromises: Still, the California IPP customers are in a bind, White said. Because they have largely paid for the plant, walking away from the contracts would mean abandoning a huge investment. And because the cities get half their electricity from IPP, they would have to figure out how to replace it without running afoul of the law.

That uncertainty grew worse when Los Angeles declined to discuss its contract extension with IPP, leaving the smaller cities without their accustomed leader.

"In the old days, L.A. was the major tenant and the rest followed along," White said.

But Los Angeles did use its influence to get IPP to back off its original 2007 renewal deadline, Fletcher said.

"We were under pressure to make a decision or lose an asset," he said. "L.A. made them blink."

IPA already is working with Los Angeles to investigate a clean-coal technology called Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle, Merrill said. While a third unit at IPP is planned to be conventional coal, a fourth plant could be IGCC or something similar, he said.

IGCC is a cleaner alternative to conventional coal because the process strips out carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas contributing to global warming. The resulting synthetic natural gas fires the power plant.

IGCC technology has proven out at plants built on the coasts. New research in Wyoming and South Dakota will test capabilities at Intermountain elevations. Key to success is the ability to capture carbon dioxide and use it or inject it back into the ground.

The Delta plant has a great advantage, Searle said, because it sits atop a huge salt dome, which could be a good injection site.

Besides examining IGCC potential, Los Angeles and IPP have been looking at biomass and other alternative fuels. "This is an issue that will not go away," Searle said.

phenetz@sltrib.com