California Climate Law Boosts Solar Power and Building Retrofits

RSSfeed

California lawmakers on Friday passed a watered-down version of what state Senate President Kevin de Leon had billed as part of the “most far-reaching effort to fight climate change in the history of our nation.”


More...

BB.

Watch what is coming down the road... I just got a notice that my minimum charge went from $4.50 per month to $10.00 per month with GT solar (still cheap)... But the reshuffling of solar power subsidies are coming and if you have a small system, can change the economics pretty quickly.

-Bill

sub3marathonman

Has California (or anyplace else beside here with Lakeland Electric in Central Florida) started requiring interconnected PV customers to go on a Residential Demand Rate schedule, and if so what are the rates?

Lakeland Electric has such a requirement scheduled to go into effect 10/1/15, but they've said they're modifying it to only on-peak demand.  This seems to be fairer, but it still seems unfair to require only PV customers to be on the rate.

BB.

California state PUC have played with solar rates a lot over the decade or two... I am not sure right know, but in the past we had the choice of flat rate or time of day (and seasonal) rate plans.

And, for a while, they forced new GT users to go on a Time of Day rate plan--For some folks (large day times loads and a small solar system)--It made for some home owner bills to go higher with solar rather than less.

Here is our utility pricing for Time of Use (note base line is around 300 kWH per month for me):

http://www.pge.com/tariffs/tm2/pdf/ELEC_SCHEDS_E-6.pdf  

Total Energy Rates $ per kWh) PEAK PART-PEAK OFF-PEAK

Summer
Baseline Usage $0.32654 (I) $0.21127 (I) $0.13449 (I)
101% - 130% of Baseline $0.35778 (I) $0.24251 (I) $0.16574 (I)
131% - 200% of Baseline $0.41064 (R) $0.29537 (R) $0.21859 (R)
201% - 300% of Baseline $0.47952 (R) $0.36425 (R) $0.28747 (R)
Over 300% of Baseline $0.47952 (R) $0.36425 (R) $0.28747 (R)

Winter
Baseline Usage – $0.15566 (I) $0.13883 (I)
101% - 130% of Baseline – $0.18690 (I) $0.17007 (I)
131% - 200% of Baseline – $0.23976 (R) $0.22293 (R)
201% - 300% of Baseline – $0.30864 (R) $0.29181 (R)
Over 300% of Baseline – $0.30864 (R) $0.29181 (R)


-Bill

SolarPowered

Assembly Bill 327 outlines all of the schedules until 2017 or before the MW cap is reached.
https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201320140AB327