Washington UTC Continues work on Third Party Ownership and Interconnection Procedures
In December, the Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission continued work in proceeding UE-112133, to revise state-jurisdictional interconnection standards. Interestingly, this work also includes a discussion of third-party ownership for customer-sited distributed generation. While typically addressed in net metering rules, third party ownership is an issue in Washington’s interconnection procedures due to restrictive language in the…
In December, the Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission continued work in proceeding UE-112133, to revise state-jurisdictional interconnection standards. Interestingly, this work also includes a discussion of third-party ownership for customer-sited distributed generation. While typically addressed in net metering rules, third party ownership is an issue in Washington’s interconnection procedures due to restrictive language in the current procedures.
IREC was a participant in the working group that developed the draft interconnection rule and has submitted several rounds of comments encouraging a broad range of reforms. The draft rule features many improvements from the existing standards, including technical review screens for expedited review of Level 1 (inverter-based systems 25 kW or less) and Level 2 (500 kW or less) generators. The UTC requested comments on these draft rules, which were due in December. The draft rules include a new proposed definition of an “interconnection customer” that would explicitly recognize he ability of third-party owned systems to engage in net metering in Washington. This alone would be a significant advance for DG policy in the state and would remove a significant barrier to market growth.
