Several companies in the region that use large amounts of energy in manufacturing have shut down production, laying off thousands of workers, either because they cannot afford skyrocketing electricity rates or because they can make windfall profits reselling the electricity they purchased at much lower prices than the current rates.

Tacoma Power in Tacoma, Washington, was granted a 43 percent rate increase by the city council December 20--half the rate increase the power company was requesting. Power that sold for $30 a megawatt-hour last spring has spiked as high as $3,000 a megawatt-hour.

City officials have suggested they may authorize even higher rates after February. Already retired workers on fixed incomes and many working-class families are being severely affected. They are being forced to reduce thermostat settings and worrying about how they can afford the new rate increase, torn between paying for food, medicine, and rent. An administrator for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program in Tacoma reported that many retired people have expressed fear of having their utilities cut off.

Georgia-Pacific announced December 6 it was shutting its paper plant in Bellingham, Washington, putting about 800 workers out of a job. Georgia-Pacific's general plant manager said energy price increases--from $1.2 million a month to $4 million a month--were the reason for the shutdown.

Kaiser Aluminum Corp. shut down its Mead, Washington, smelter December 10, just two months after workers had returned from a two-year lockout battle with the employer. "Kaiser Aluminum has already netted $100 million in windfall profits from the resale of a few months of BPA [Bonneville Power Administration] power and stands to realize $300 million more at current electrical rates in the next nine months," said David Foster, director of District 11 of the United Steelworkers of America.

"Right now, the economics are such that you can make much more money selling power than you can producing aluminum," declared Kaiser Aluminum spokesperson Susan Ashe.

Some 400 workers will be idled for at least 10 months at Kaiser's Mead smelter in Spokane, Washington--the fourth of 10 smelters in the Northwest to close due to high power costs. Kaiser Aluminum has said it will pay laid-off workers 70 percent of their wages and full medical benefits while they are out of work, but is not contractually bound to do so, said the union.

Behind the skyrocketing energy prices in the Northwest is the decision by federal energy officials in mid-December to order energy suppliers in the Northwest to send emergency electricity to California (see article on page 7).

Cecelia Moriarity is a meat packer and a member of the United Food and Commercial Workers union.
 
 
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