California Approves Renewable Plans for Investor-Owned Utilities

On November 8, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) approved the renewable energy plans of the state’s utilities, paving the way for the utilities to solicit, bids for green energy procurement.

California’s Renewables Portfolio Standard (RPS) is one of the most ambitious renewable energy standards in the country. The RPS program requires investor-owned utilities, electric service providers, and community choice aggregators to increase procurement from eligible renewable energy resources to 33 percent of total procurement by 2020.

This decision approves the renewable energy procurement plans of Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Southern California Edison, and San Diego Gas & Electric. The decision allows SCE to forego holding a 2012 RPS solicitation and instead focus on procurement from small distributed generation renewables. The utilities must file final RPS procurement plans with the CPUC to initiate the RPS solicitation process within 14 days.

The decision includes modifications pertaining to standard variables for the least-cost, best-fit bid evaluation methodology; contract termination rights based on higher than expected transmission upgrade costs; and the use of energy-only and full deliverability Time of Delivery factors.

The RPS proposal can be found here.

Source: CPUC news release

Laurel Passera

Laurel is a Senior Renewables Analyst for IREC attorneys Keyes, Fox & Wiedman, and engages in research and analysis of net metering and interconnection regulatory trends to support IREC’s outreach and communication efforts. In 2009, Laurel was a Southeast Regional Network fellow for the Southeast Environmental Leadership Program and currently sits on Raleigh City Council’s Environmental Advisory Board.