(The Center Square) – The Arizona Senate Wednesday passed Senate Bill 1309, which aims to prevent California-style blackouts.
The vote was 17 to 12. One senator did not vote.
State Sen. Frank Carroll, R-Rio Vista, introduced this bill earlier in February to ensure Arizonans have a power supply during the hot summer months.
SB 1309 mandates that the Arizona Corporation Commission makes sure changes to the state’s grid can produce enough electricity for the summer and winter.
Furthermore, this bill requires a power generation resource mix that avoids blackouts and brownouts unrelated to harsh weather or power quality incidents.
SB 1309 says ACC must mandate that if an electric generation plant retires, its replacement can provide the same amount of energy.
Caroll said the “extremist environmental agenda” Democrats have adopted has caused Americans to suffer the consequences of preventable outages, jeopardizing people’s lives in heat waves and extremely cold weather.
“I sponsored SB 1309 to prevent the chaos associated with blackouts, as we’ve seen in states like California when dangerous green agendas are adopted,” he said.
Carroll added that people want a “cleaner environment,” but not if it threatens human life.
The senator called 1309 a “commonsense measure” to ensure “Arizonans’ air conditioners, heaters, lights and other basic necessities have the power to operate when we need them to.”
Data from Climate Central last year showed Arizona had only six major outages related to weather between 2000 and 2023.
The top three states for this period were Texas (210), Michigan (157) and California (145).
Journal of Environmental Science and Technology conducted a 2023 study that stated a midday blackout in Phoenix would send over 50% of residents to emergency medical care.
