Sierra Pacific Power Company
Contact: Karl Walquist (775)834-3891
Bob Sagan (775)834-4834
Phone: See Contacts

For Immediate Release

California customers tied into SPPCo. grid

California electric customers served by Sierra Pacific Power Co. are not being impacted by the electricity problems in California, the utility said today.

"Our 45,000 customers in California are tied into the Sierra Pacific power grid," said Mike Smart, Sierra's acting vice president for Resource Management."As such, they're not experiencing the same problems as those Californians served by Pacific Gas and Electric."

Smart said Sierra Pacific's generating plants are running as expected, and the company also has a combination of mid-term and long-term purchased power contracts in place that have locked in lower-priced energy. The company generates about 50 percent of its energy and purchases the other half.

"Short of an act of God that would bring down our generation, we don't expect any problems," Smart said."Our resource planners and power traders do a great job anticipating our future energy demand, and then go searching for the best purchases they can make to answer it."