By Seth Masia
In 1989, a power engineer for Pacific Gas & Electric Co. named Dan Shugar proved that distributed solar reduced the peak loads handled by transmission lines and transformers. This meant that a utility company could save a lot of money by encouraging small solar installations scattered around its service territory. When air conditioning loads are met in part by power generated in the neighborhood, it reduces the need for expensive new power lines from central generating plants. It even reduces the need for expensive new generating plants.
That's still true. The more distributed power comes on the grid, the less ratepayers must pay for new and upgraded facilities. A number of municipal utility districts (notably in Sacramento, Calif. and Austin, Texas) have made good use of distributed power to cut their maintenance and infrastructure costs. Austin utility calculates that the value of solar to its own operations is more that 12 cents per kilowatt-hour, and that's what it pays for rooftop power. The argument was so persuasive that over the years, 43 states have adopted net-metering rules to encourage distributed solar.
But investor-owed utility companies (IOUs) don't see it that way. What they see is that they make money by selling electricity, and owners of rooftop solar buy less of that. And they see that they have traditionally made money by building new generating and transmission facilities (most regulated utilities are allowed to earn a profit on everything they build or buy, from nuclear plants to coal).
Many utilities now recognize that they can make money building large solar and wind farms, with the transmission lines to handle the new capacity. The cost is passed on to ratepayers, and the electricity is sold just as if it came from a coal or nuclear or hydro plant.
But distributed generation, owned by homeowners, ranchers, farmers or leasing companies, is a serious threat to a utility's business plan. In January, 2013, the Edison Electric Institute (EEI) - a research organization funded by the utility industry - called distributed generation and net metering a "disruptive" threat, and made the following recommendation:
While net metering policies vary by state, generally customers with rooftop solar or other DG systems are credited for any electricity they sell via the electric power grid. Electric companies are required to buy this power typically at the full retail rate, which includes all of the fixed costs of the poles, wires, meters, advanced technologies, and other infrastructure that makes the grid safe, reliable, and able to accommodate solar panels or other DG systems. Through the credit they receive, net-metered customers effectively are avoiding paying these costs for the grid. As a result, these costs are shifted to those customers without rooftop solar or other DG systems through higher utility bills.
Net metering policies and rate structures in many states should be updated so that everyone who uses the electric grid helps pay to maintain it and to keep it operating reliably at all times. This will ensure that all customers have safe and reliable electricity and that electric rates are fair and affordable for all customers.
In effect, EEI chose to ignore the work done by Dan Shugar's team 24 years ago. The industry now claims that non-solar ratepayers support the grid infrastructure and solar ratepayers do not.
And so, over the past year, utilities in California, Arizona, Georgia and Colorado have sought to add a surcharge to the monthly electricity bills paid by the owners of rooftop solar arrays.
- In California, the nation's largest and most progressive solar market, IOUs backed Assembly Bill 327, which would have imposed a flat $10 fee on all ratepayers as a regressive way to support the grid infrastructure; and it would have ended net metering next year. The solar industry and solar homeowners fought back and got the bill amended into something much more solar-friendly. When signed into law in August, AB 327 continues net metering and gives the California Public Utilities Commission authority to lift caps on net metering and even on the 33-percent renewable portfolio standard.
- In Arizona, the IOU Arizona Public Service asked for permission to impose up to $50 monthly surcharge on electric bills paid by net-metered homeowners and small businesses. Free-market conservatives led by Barry Goldwater, Jr. joined with solar advocates to fight the new fee. While the state's Corporation Commission generally agreed that APS needed the fee, in November they slashed it 90 percent. New solar system owners will for now have to pay 70 cents per kilowatt of installed capacity, per month, or about $4.90 for 7kW system. It's a setback but not a show stopper for solar installations. The door is open, however, for the Commission to raise the fee in years to come, so the battle will continue.
- Georgia Power was dead set against any form of solar power. Consumers - conservative and conservationist alike - were enraged when the IOU pushed through a surcharge to support construction of nuclear power plants. The result: Tea Party and Sierra Club activists came together as the Green Tea Coalition. They lobbied hard, cited Austin's value-of-solar experience, and in July convinced the Public Service Commission to mandate 525 MW of solar power. Click here for the full story.
- That same month, in Colorado, Xcel Energy filed its power delivery plans for 2014. The company said that its value of solar was only 4.6 cents per kWh, and it wants to slash the net-metering rate, currently set at the retail electricity rate of 10.5 cents. And it wants to impose a monthly grid-maintenance charge. The solar industry will fight back vigorously. Hearings are set to begin Feb. 3.
Challenges will be mounted to distributed energy in more states. Local solar advocates need to follow utility-company actions closely and be prepared to respond.
In the meantime, energy free choice has emerged as an issue that can unite solar advocates from the right and left. In the spirit of the season, it's time to reach out to your neighbors of all political persuasions, and make common cause over energy independence.
You can help! Join and support your local chapter
of the American Solar Energy Society.
Solar Citizen is a program of the American Solar Energy Society.
Learn more, and share this email with a friend.
Rethinking Congress: A revolutionary plan to make it more responsive
A year away from the 2014 elections, most of California's congressional races already have been decided. Even though California used a Citizens Redistricting Commission to draw its districts and uses a Top Two system to elect its members of Congress, very few of its voters will have a meaningful choice next November.
FairVote's Monopoly Politics 2014 projects 36 of California's 53 districts to be won by at least 20 percent next year, and only nine districts to be seriously contested by the non-incumbent party. Even though Top Two created some intraparty general election runoffs in 2012, nearly all still were won in a landslide, and evidence from Washington State suggests that parties may adapt to Top Two to discourage such intraparty competition in the future.
The same is true nationwide: FairVote projects winners in 373 of 435 congressional districts. That means more than 85 percent of seats are so safe that nothing in the upcoming year will change the outcome. Using the same methodology last year, FairVote was correct in all 333 of our projections. There was more turnover due to redistricting, but now most incumbents are even more entrenched.
Here's an even more startling finding. Due to a combination of partisan gerrymandering, incumbency advantages, declines in ticket-splitting and the concentration of Democratic voters in urban areas, House Republicans likely would keep their majority with as little as 45 percent of the national vote in 2014.
This creates an obvious disadvantage for Democrats, but it hurts Republicans too. Because almost all House incumbents only fear primary challenges, they move further from the center. Republicans can ignore changes in the electorate, making it harder to win the White House and Senate.
Most importantly, unaccountable congressional leadership means dysfunctional government.
But we could reform Congress with ranked-choice voting in multiseat districts. Used in many nations and American cities, ranked-choice voting allows voters to indicate their preferences. When used to elect several candidates, it guarantees more diverse representation than our winner-take-all elections in which a handful of primary voters decides everyone's representation.
As shown in our 50-state plan at FairVoting.us, the House would be the same size but would be elected from a smaller number of multiseat districts. Each voter would have one potent vote in elections for between three and five representatives, according to the district's population.
Our plan for California's congressional elections creates 15 super districts, each with three or five seats according to population. With ranked-choice voting in the primary and the general election, the parties would become more diverse and less rigid. In a typical election, Democrats would win 32 to 33 seats and Republicans 20 to 21 -- a fairer reflection of California's voters. Far more voters, including racial minorities and women, would be able to earn fair representation, and there would be no talk of spoilers.
Most states already have used multiseat districts to elect members of Congress or state legislators, but in 1967 Congress mandated single-seat House districts. Before the next round of redistricting in 2021, Congress should pass a law requiring all states to use ranked-choice voting in multiseat districts drawn by independent commissions. California could reform its state legislative elections even sooner.
With ranked-choice voting, we could restore the founders' vision of a truly representative and accountable People's House. It's time to achieve the reform that truly would put voters in charge in every election.
Rob Richie is executive director and Devin McCarthy is a policy analyst at FairVote, a nonpartisan organization based in Maryland. They wrote this for this newspaper.
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