Sierra Club v. City of Glendale CA2/5

INTRODUCTION

In February 2022, the Glendale City Council certified an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) and approved a project (the Repowering Project or the Project) to remove outdated power generators from the Grayson Power Plant (Grayson), run by Glendale Water and Power (GWP), and replace them with modern, state-of-art equipment. Plaintiff and appellant Sierra Club (Sierra) filed a petition for writ of mandate, arguing that defendants and respondents the City of Glendale (the City), the City Council, and GWP violated the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA)1 by approving the Project based upon an inadequate EIR. Sierra appeals the trial court’s decision to deny its writ petition. Sierra contends the EIR’s project description and objectives rested on the inaccurate understanding that GWP was legally obligated to have sufficient reserve capacity to meet demand if it lost both its largest and then second largest sources of electricity. The decision to cover loss of the second largest source, according to Sierra, is not based on any genuine legal requirement, and therefore the EIR misled the City Council into approving an unnecessarily large project. Sierra also contends…