1. The requirement for a "written commitment" that the new property owner will adhere to non-transferable, interim resource agency permits and conditions (Mitigation Measure 4.7.a.1) should be augmented with written confirmation by affected resource agencies that existing enforcement and permit violation processes are adequate to allow such interim permits to remain valid.

1. The City has Cultural Resource Guidelines (dated December 1990) which should be referenced for compliance by the Mitigated Negative Declaration. The Guidelines provide the local procedures for investigating and recovering cultural resource sites.

2. The City feels that an initial archeology survey for all SDG&E properties should have been incorporated into the Initial Study. That way the mitigation measures proposed would have the benefit of knowing the required level of site recovery/assessment that is needed to avoid significant impacts. Furthermore, the City feels that the proposed mitigation measures for Cultural Resource impacts are inadequate without a baseline archaeological survey being completed. The Initial Study also states that other archaeological sites may exist and be uncovered during grading work with an archaeologist/grading monitor being involved. The full scope of on-site archaeological/cultural resources needs to be known before a mitigation program can be prepared in the context of a Mitigated Negative Declaration.

3. A specific mitigation measure should be the requirement for a City issued grading permit for any earth-moving, grading, soil remediation work, etc. Such a grading permit would then be subject to local level environmental review.

a) Both Variants 1 and 2 assume an increase in the power importation capacity of the San Diego Area of 400 MW above the 1999 importation capacity. It seems very likely that a project of this magnitude can be permitted and constructed by 2005.

b) Variants 1 and 2 assume that one or both of the Encina or the South Bay plants will be retrofitted with SCR technology. The City questions whether this assumption is realistic.

It is our understanding that it will cost approximately $40M and $50M to retrofit South Bay and Encina plants respectively with SCR. Under Variant 2, it does not seem realistic to assume that a new owner would 1) pay a large sum of money to purchase the South Bay facility, 2) spend an additional $40M to retrofit the facility with SCR by 2001, 3) spend hundreds of millions of dollars more to build a new facility, and then 4) shut down the South Bay facility in 2005.

Furthermore, it does not seem economically realistic to assume that anyone can satisfy Rule 69 as it currently exists and also replace an existing facility with a new facility. It is not practical to assume that anyone would spend $40M in 2000 and then stop operating a facility in 2005. In order for anyone to shut down either of the two facilities and replace them with a new facility, it seems that Rule 69 will need to be amended to allow a new owner to operate the current facilities without spending any money while a new plant is constructed. If the Mitigated Negative Declaration is going to assume that Encina and/or South Bay are operated until a replacement plant becomes operational, then it must also address the issue of whether Rule 69 would need to be changed.

2. Rule 69 requires the current owners of the Encina and South Bay plants to cap their cumulative emissions to 2100 tons/year after January 1, 1997, to 800 tons/year after January 1, 2001, and to 650 tons/year after January 1, 2005. The Mitigated Negative Declaration should calculate baseline and analytical maximum scenarios for all three years (not just 1999 and 2005) and should assess whether the increase in emissions warrant a finding of significant environmental impact for all three years.

3. Variant 2 of the Mitigated Negative Declaration projects 988 tons of NOx per year, a 338 ton per year increase above the 650 NOx ton/year baseline that is required in Rule 69. Page 4.5-38 then states that the 2005 cumulative impact is not considered significant for three reasons. The City disagrees with all three reasons and believes that the increase in emissions is significant.

4. It is our understanding that one of the criteria that is used to determine whether or not a project is deemed to have a significant environmental impact is whether or not the project produces emission levels that are inconsistent with regional air quality plans. Rule 69 caps power plant emissions in San Diego to 650 tons on NOx per year, and the City assumes that this level is included in the SDAPCD’s regional plan. The City believes that Variant 2, which shows an increase of NOx emissions by 52%, is inconsistent with the regional air quality plan, and therefore the Variant should be deemed to have a significant impact.