Edison International

Edison International is a generator and distributor of electric power and an investor in infrastructure and energy assets. Edison International is a holding company of Southern California Edison Company (SCE). SCE is a public utility primarily engaged in the business of supplying electricity to an approximately 50,000-square-mile area of southern California. 

The SCE service territory contains a population of nearly 14 million people and SCE serves the population through approximately 5 million customer accounts. In August 2013, Edison International completed the acquisition of SoCore Energy, LLC.

1887: The first commercial hydroelectric plant in the West was built in the community of Highgrove near the City of Riverside.

1890: The Ventura Land and Power Company installed hydroelectric generation to power arc lights in downtown Ventura, thereby catching up with their Santa Barbara neighbour further up the coast.

1891: Local businessman Henry Sinclair and Doctor Cyrus G. Baldwin, the first president of Pomona College, co-founded the San Antonio Light and Power Company.

1892: Introducing three-phase alternating current generation, Henry Sinclair formed the Redlands Electric Light and Power Company to provide power to the Union Ice Company for the new electric motors in its ice-making facility in Mentone.

1894: The recently constructed Mill Creek hydroelectric plant powered electric pumps installed to irrigate many of the orange groves in Redlands.

1895: The Kaweah Power and Water Company were formed to survey the potential development of hydroelectric facilities on the Kaweah River above Visalia and Tulare County.

1896: Most history texts consider the Niagara Falls to Buffalo, New York transmission line as the first long-distance electric line in the nation built this year, but the reality is that Decker did it four years earlier in San Antonio Canyon. Meeting Los Angeles' fast-growing need for electricity, Henry Sinclair of the Redlands Electric Light and Power Company teamed up with Henry Fisher, a prominent Redlands resident, to form the Southern California Power Company to pursue the construction of a new hydroelectric facility on the Santa Ana River.

1897: To eliminate the growing overhead clutter of power, telegraph, and telephone lines in downtown Los Angeles, the City Council adopted an undergrounding ordinance. The San Gabriel Electric Company was formed to construct a hydroelectric facility on the San Gabriel River in Azusa Canyon. John Barnes Miller joined Westside Lighting as its General Manager in 1897.

1898: Hydroelectric power & the Santa Ana River, he purchased the Los Angeles Railway known popularly as the "Yellow car" system.

1899: The Azusa Hydro Plant began transmitting power into Los Angeles along a 23-mile transmission line.

1903: Eastwood had completed an exploration of the hydroelectric potential in the area of Shaver and Huntington Lakes.

1904: Invested in the Kern River Co.

1906: The Ventura County Power Company was incorporated and acquired the electricity systems in Ventura, Oxnard, and Santa Paula. The Imperial Irrigation District had been formed to organize irrigation investments to serve local farmers.

1907: The world's highest-voltage transmission line, Edison Electric began producing power from its newly constructed Kern River Hydro Power House.

1909: Southern California Edison was organized in August to acquire all of Edison's properties.

1910: In his quest for electricity to power his growing trolley empire, Henry Huntington would eventually pour massive financial resources into developing Big Creek beginning of the year. The largest privately financed hydroelectric project of the era.

1912: The City of Los Angeles buys facilities from SCE.

1913: Building Big Creek to supply electricity to Los Angeles.

1917: The city of Los Angeles purchased Edison's distribution system inside the city, and began to buy power wholesale from Edison for its municipal plant. The firm acquires Pacific Light & Power Corporation and a controlling interest in Mount Whitney Power & Electric Company.

1920: Sale to the City of Pasadena.

1921: SCE had four 18-foot kayaks built and, in partnership with the United States Geological Survey, began a survey of 800 miles of the Colorado River from Green River, Utah to Needles, California to determine the best location for hydroelectric dams.

1928: Through this year, the area's population was growing so rapidly that Edison had no problem using this greatly increased capacity. They built the world's largest highest-head hydro plant.

1930: By the end of the year, revenues had reached $41 million, and the balance Edison had achieved between hydroelectric and steam generation helped protect the company against fluctuating earnings due to weather problems or fuel-price hikes. The company changed its name to Southern California Edison Company Ltd. As well this year, construction began on the Boulder Dam--later renamed Hoover Dam--project.

1931: The world's largest man-made lake The project was huge, amounting to one-twelfth of the federal budget.

1939: SCE began receiving its share of power from Hoover Dam across a 220-kilovolt transmission line that had just been completed.

1943: Late in the year, Southern Sierra capitulated and sold its local facilities to IID.

1946: SCE switched its 50-cycle system to a 60-cycle system to conform with the standard.

1954: SCE built a generating station at El Segundo.

1956: Invested in smog research & pollution control.

1958: From 1845 to 1970, SCE built 10 new gas and oil-fired steam plants along the coast, to keep up with the booming population of Southern California. One of these was the Huntington Beach Steam Plant which began operations in 1958.

1960: Almost half of Edison's power output was fueled by natural gas, more than one-third by oil, and the rest primarily hydroelectric.

1962: Expanded to Catalina Island.

1964: SCE merges with CalElectric.

1968: SCE completed construction of its 450-megawatt San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station Unit 1.

1970: When the share fueled by natural gas was down to 56 percent, the company began to enter long-term oil supply contracts in anticipation of this reversal continuing.

1971: Mohave Generating Plant began operations.

1973: Edison ranked behind only New York's Consolidated Edison, Chicago's Commonwealth Edison, and the Southern Company of Atlanta, Georgia in gross revenues for electric companies, bringing in nearly $1 billion. The oil embargo of 1973 created difficulties for many utility companies, including Edison, and the price of electricity increased throughout the United States. In response to environmental concerns and the high fossil fuel prices following the Arab Oil Embargo of 1973, SCE ceased its efforts to market more electricity and initiated customer conservation programs to encourage its customers to use electricity more efficiently.

1978: SCE and Union Oil agreed to design, construct and operate a 10-megawatt geothermal power plant at Brawley, near the Salton Sea.

1980: Edison began generating 3,000 kilowatts with a wind-powered turbine at San Gorgonio Pass near Palm Springs, California. Within a few months of being named chairman, William R. Gould unveiled a plan calling for a major commitment to alternative and renewable energy sources in the coming years. Edison begins to focus on alternative and renewable energy.

1981: Oil, gas, and coal supplied the fuel for 70 percent of the company's 15.5-million kilowatt capacity. It purchased the steam required to produce about 10,000 kilowatts of power from a geothermal well operated by Union Oil Company of California.

1984: Bryson, a former head of the CPUC, joined Edison as chief financial officer. 

1987: Edison was the second-largest electric-generating company in the United States, earning a company record $789 million that year. Another engineering wonder at Big Creek

1990: Company records were set in both earnings and revenue. Howard Allen retired and was replaced as chairman and chief executive of both SCEcorp and Edison by John Bryson.

1993: The company's financing arm, Edison Capital, began investing in affordable housing projects and started to provide financing to the Dutch national rail authority.

1996: SCEcorp changes its name to Edison International; deregulation begins in California's energy sector. A second venture, Solar 2, began operations. 

1998: California's market opened up to competition, which marked the beginning of a chaotic period for California's citizens, the state's utility companies, the government, and investors around the world.

2005: Extending the useful life of the San Onofre plant.

2009: Obama visits SCE electric vehicle facility.

2013: The San Onofre nuclear plant is closed permanently. 

“To deliver reliable, affordable electricity safely.”

“At Edison International, our vision is to lead the transformation of the electric power industry toward a clean energy future.”