Enron Played Central Role in California Energy Crisis

In California, the state’s former governor Gray Davis praised the jury for convicting Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling. Davis said “Given the way Enron ripped off California, I think the jury did an excellent job. I take some solace in the fact that Ken Lay and Skilling will spend some time in prison.” Six years ago, California was plunged into an unprecedented energy crisis. Rolling blackouts shut down parts of the state. Power bills soared. It turned out that at the center of the crisis was Enron – although the company’s role wasn’t fully understood at the time.

Two years ago lawyers involved in a lawsuit in Washington state obtained audiotapes that proved Enron asked power companies to take plants offline at the height of the California energy crisis - in order to make more money. In one taped phone call an Enron employee celebrated the fact that a massive forest fire had shut down a transmission line carrying energy into California causing the price of energy to rise.

* Excerpts of the Enron Tapes.

In this phone call an Enron employee talked about how the company had ripped off poor grandmothers in California.

* Excerpts of the Enron Tapes.

Enron employees also discussed the possibility of Ken Lay becoming Secretary of Energy if George W. Bush won the 2000 election.

* Excerpts of the Enron Tapes.

And in this phone call from January 2001 an Enron employee asked a worker at a power plant in Las Vegas to take the plant offline. That same day energy supplies were so tight that Northern California experienced a Stage 3 power emergency and rolling blackouts hit as many as 2 million consumers.

* Excerpts of the Enron Tapes.

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