2. Background
Southern California Edison Company (SCE) is an investor-owned public utility operating an interconnected and integrated electric utility system that generates, transmits, and distributes electric energy in portions of Central and Southern California.2 In addition to its California properties, SCE separately or jointly owns facilities in Nevada, Arizona, and New Mexico that produce power and energy for use in California.
The Proposed Project will provide additional transmission capacity serving the City of Hanford and the surrounding areas of unincorporated Kings County to ensure customer electrical demand is met safely and reliably. In conjunction with the filing of Application (A.) 09-11-020 (Application), SCE filed its Proponent's Environmental Assessment (PEA).
The electrical needs of the Cities of Hanford and unincorporated Kings County (the Electrical Needs Area) are currently served from SCE's Hanford Substation, located in Hanford, California. SCE installed a 16.8 megavolt ampere (MVA) transformer bank at the Hanford Substation as a contingency measure and will reconductor the 12 kilovolt (kV) bus at Hanford to increase capacity until the Mascot Project is operational.
2 SCE's service territory is located in 15 counties in Central and Southern California, consisting of Fresno, Imperial, Inyo, Kern, Kings, Los Angeles, Madera, Mono, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, Santa Barbara, Tulare, Tuolumne and Ventura Counties, and includes approximately 179 incorporated communities and outlying rural territories. SCE also supplies electricity to certain customers for resale under tariffs filed with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
