There's a better way to do this
If the goal is clean, reliable power, a new 500 kV corridor through Temecula isn't the only way to get there — and often not the cheapest or least damaging. These are the alternatives the environmental review is supposed to weigh seriously. (We're expanding each of these into a full deep-dive.)
- AlternativeWork in progress
Is a New Line Even Needed?
The simplest, lowest-impact alternative is the one the law already requires the review to study: don't build it. The case that this line isn't actually needed is stronger than it sounds — and it has stopped an SDG&E 500 kV line in this corridor before.
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A 40-Year Bet: Outdated Before It's Paid Off?
The line wouldn't switch on until about 2032, but ratepayers would pay it off for roughly forty years after that — on today's assumptions. The risk: locking in a giant, single-purpose line right as faster, cheaper, modular options mature.
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Generate It Where We Live: Local Solar + Storage
Instead of a 150-mile line to bring distant desert power to the coast, build more of that clean power where it's actually used — rooftop, parking-lot, and community solar paired with batteries. Here are the numbers, the way a utility or grid planner would lay them out.
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Upgrade the Lines We Already Have
Before building a brand-new 500 kV corridor, upgrade the existing grid — “reconductoring” lines with advanced conductors and adding grid-enhancing technology can add capacity in the corridors that already exist.
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A Better Route — or No New Corridor
If a line is genuinely needed, the law requires studying routes that do less harm — using existing corridors and avoiding Temecula Creek, homes, and protected land — as well as the “no new corridor” option.
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Bury the Sensitive Stretches
Where the line must pass near homes, schools, the hospital, or Temecula Creek, undergrounding is a real, deployed option — the regulators have ordered it for a 500 kV line before.
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