Organized Labor

Work on the Trans Bay Cable project is on schedule to be completed and online by mid 2010, with construction crews preparing the site on the San Francisco side of the Bay at 23rd and Illinois. The project consists of an approximately 53-mile-long high voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission line that will run under the San Francisco Bay to transfer already existing energy from an electric transmission system substation in Pittsburg to a San Francisco substation. The Pittsburg side broke ground in Nov. 2007; groundbreaking in San Francisco began in January 2008.

Work on the Trans Bay Cable project is on schedule to be completed and online by mid 2010, with construction crews preparing the site on the San Francisco side of the Bay at 23rd and Illinois. The project consists of an approximately 53-mile-long high voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission line that will run under the San Francisco Bay to transfer already existing energy from an electric transmission system substation in Pittsburg to a San Francisco substation. The Pittsburg side broke ground in Nov. 2007; groundbreaking in San Francisco began in January 2008.

The project was chosen by the California Independent System Operator (CAISO) to provide reliable energy to the City of San Francisco. The CAISO decided that the northern San Francisco Peninsula needs an additional transmission line to ensure energy reliability in 2010 and beyond.

At a recent visit to the SF site, a handful of Operating Engineers and Pile Drivers were on the job, grading and driving pile for the new facility across the street from PG&E's Portrero Point transmission station.

Wilhelm Napier, an Electrical Engineer and Power Production and Distribution Specialist is Project Consultant for Transbay Cable, LLC's project. Trans Bay Cable LLC is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Babcock & Brown, which financed the project in cooperation with Pittsburg Power Company, which would generate the electricity.

Napier explained that the project involves construction of two converters on each side of the Bay. On the Pittsburg side the AC will be converted to Direct Current to travel on the cable under the San Francisco Bay, then be converted back to AC and tied in to PG&E's station across 23rd Street. Napier said that conversion from AC to DC and back to AC was an efficient system because direct current only requires two cables instead of the three required for AC and would be less expensive to build. The direct current also does not have any loss of electricity or electromagnetic radiation as it travels over the cable. Concern for the environmental impacts of the electromagnetic radiation on sea life was a factor in choosing the DC transmission system.

Napier said that the cable would run along a shallow trench on the Bay floor. The trench will be dug using a hydro-plow to blast and remove silt. He said the process would be challenging as the topography of the Bay floor had some obstructions.

Dan Copans, a Project Manager for Cleveland Wrecking, said work is being done under a Project Stabilization Agreement, similar to a PLA but mandating that all contractors are union contractors. Cleveland Wrecking is a signatory to Master Agreements with the Operating Engineers and Laborers unions and worked on the demolition of the AirGas and DHL buildings that occupied the site. There are currently just a handful of Operating Engineers doing grading. Laborers Local 67 members employed by Sterling Engineering are working on abatement of lead paint at one of the nearby buildings.

The global energy company Siemens developed new technology for the two substations, Napier said. Trans Bay Cable, LLC awarded Siemens Power Transmission & Distribution, Inc. a contract worth more than US $150 million for the project in October 2007. According to Siemen's reported that, "The project will be implemented by a consortium of Siemens and Milan-based Prysmian Energy Cables and Systems. As consortium leader, Siemens was awarded a turnkey contract that comprises the converter stations for the HVDC PLUS system, including engineering, design, manufacturing, installation and commissioning of the HVDC transmission system. Prysmian will provide the submarine power cables that will be installed in the San Francisco Bay."

Subcontractors include Roebbelen Construction, Stroer and Graf for the pile driving, AC Jones for grading work, and Cupertino Electric. IBEW members were scheduled to begin work as Organized Labor went to press. Sacramento-based Roebbelen has worked on other power plant construction projects, including for the Jones Fork Hydroelectric Power Plant for the Sacramento Municipal Utility District.

Napier said the subcontractors had experience in similar types of construction projects but that the two new facilities were unique. He said the TBC project was an opportunity for Siemens to kick-off the new technology. He said the SF side would be ready to receive energy by November 2009.

The TBC will have the capacity to transmit 400 megawatts of electrical power. It is designed to reduce the need for proposed in-city generation in the city of San Francisco, decrease transmission grid congestion in the East Bay, increase the overall security and reliability of the electrical system, and provide potential savings to ratepayers, according to the developer.

The East Bay Business Times reported that the project has a "price tag of $450 million. Cost estimates have jumped 50 percent, up from $300 million when it was first proposed three years ago."

"Trans Bay Cable's mission is to provide a commercially viable energy solution for greater San Francisco. As energy demand increases worldwide, high-voltage direct current transmission plays an increasingly important role, particularly in megacities like San Francisco, especially as it becomes necessary to tap energy reserves far away from the point of consumption," Trans Bay Cable vice president David Parquet told the East Bay Business Times.

PJ Johnston, a Babcock & Brown spokesperson at the time, told Organized Labor last May that the TBC would be a kind of "insurance line that the Cal-ISO needs." (Cal-ISO is the California Independent System Operator, the public corporation that runs the state's electrical grid.) He said the TBC, "would give Cal-ISO the comfort level needed to allow San Francisco to not have to use the Portrero Hill power plant. A new supply off the existing grid eliminates the city's reliance on in-city generation of electricity."

About 45 construction jobs will be created to build the facilities at each end of the cable, as well as some permanent jobs maintaining and operating the stations.