Some Alternate Supplier Electric Customers Paying More
The state’s Office of Consumer Counsel says thousands of residential customers who signed up with competitive electric suppliers paid more for power than customers who stayed with the standard offers from Eversource Energy or United Illuminating.
In Eversource’s territory, customers with 18 of the 28 third-party service providers paid $48 million more than the standard offer. In UI’s service area, customers with 18 of 29 competitive suppliers paid $10 million more than standard-offer customers.
Bryan Lee, a spokesman for the Retail Energy Supply Association, said the consumer advocate “is making an unfair apples-to-oranges comparison when it compares a ‘plain vanilla’ utility standard service electricity rates with the varied and complex product offerings of competitive retail energy suppliers.”
More: New Haven Register
NEW JERSEY
BL England Generating Station Looking to Convert to Gas
The owners of the coal-fired B.L. England Generating Station have applied to the Department of Environmental Protection for emissions permits to convert the plant to natural gas, now that a controversial pipeline to the facility has been approved.
“It’s probably the dirtiest plant left in the state,” DEP spokesman Larry Hajna said, adding that the 52-year-old plant is one of “just a handful” that still burn coal. The plant on the Jersey Shore is owned by RC Cape May Holdings, a special purpose entity formed by Rockland Capital, Energy Investors Funds and other investors.
Environmentalists are protesting the conversion. They say the 447-MW upgraded plant actually would increase pollution because the gas-fired plant would operate daily, while only one of the plant’s current coal units is active, and it only operates 60 days a year.
More: The Press of Atlantic City
NEW MEXICO
State Sees Rush of Solar Tax Credit Applications
Energy conservation officials have been hit with a flood of applications for the state’s solar tax credit and are on track to meet the $3 million annual cap by July.
This is the last year for the state’s 10% tax credit. A measure calling for extending the incentive through 2024 stalled during the last legislative session.
More: The Associated Press
NEW YORK
Cuomo Announces $150M For Renewables Projects
Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Thursday announced $150 million in funding to support large-scale renewable energy projects across the state to help meet the goal of 50% of electricity from renewable energy by 2030.
“This state is a national leader in combating climate change, and with this investment, we are taking our unprecedented efforts one more step toward a cleaner and greener New York,” he said. “This funding will advance large-scale energy projects, continue build[ing] a clean energy economy and generate opportunity for New Yorkers for generations to come.”
Support will be provided by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority in its final solicitation through the main tier of the state’s renewable portfolio standard.
More: Gov. Andrew Cuomo
Microgrid Competition Offers $8 Million
The next round of the NY Prize microgrid competition will provide $8 million in awards for engineering designs and business plans for community microgrids, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said.
The $40 million program is part of the Reforming the Energy Vision. The NY Prize engineering design and business plan component will award up to $1 million to each of the eight winners. The deadline for proposals is Oct. 13, 2016. The competition is administered by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, which is currently reviewing final reports and conducting an analysis and evaluation of the feasibility studies.
More: Gov. Andrew Cuomo
Study Says Preserved Nuclear Plants Cost-effective
Preserving upstate nuclear plants via a proposed Clean Energy Standard provides benefits that exceed the costs, according to an analysis by The Brattle Group for the Public Service Commission. (See NYPSC: Minimal Cost to Meet 50% Renewable Goal.)
The nuclear component of the Clean Energy Standard is responsible for more than 50% of the program’s lifetime financial benefits from carbon avoidance, despite incurring only 21% of the program’s overall costs. Power cost savings enables an additional $3.16 billion in annual gross domestic product, according to the study.
The report was prepared for the New York State IBEW Utility Labor Council, the Rochester Building and Construction Trades Council and the Central and Northern New York Building and Construction Trades Council.
More: The Brattle Group
NORTH CAROLINA
Regulators Side with Duke in NC WARN-Church Solar Deal
The Utilities Commission fined an advocacy group $60,000 for violating state law by installing a solar array on the roof of a Greensboro church and then selling the electricity directly to the church. The commission said NC WARN, by law, should have produced the power, sold it to Duke Energy, which then would have sold it to the church.
The commission said NC WARN’s direct contract with the church was impermissible because the church is located within Duke’s exclusive service area. “NC WARN knowingly entered into a contract to sell electricity in a franchised area and sold electricity without prior permission from the commission, subjecting itself to sanctions,” the commission said. It ordered the group to stop operating the solar array and to turn it over to the church.
NC WARN Director Jim Warren vowed to appeal. “The decision to impose the fine is pretty surprising,” he said. “In the past, that kind of fine has been used against outright lawbreakers.” He said the arrangement was made to test the law on electricity sales.
More: Charlotte Business Journal
Health Officials Go Silent on Safety Guidance near Ash Ponds
The Department of Health and Human Services says it has stopped offering any guidance to owners of drinking-water wells near Duke Energy coal ash ponds, citing pending legislative action that would govern water testing and advisories.
“We are carefully monitoring this proposed legislation and are not able to comment further on safety recommendations until the General Assembly takes action,” a department spokeswoman wrote in an email.
The department last year issued do-not-drink notices to owners of hundreds of wells near coal ash basins because their water contained elevated levels of hexavalent chromium, but it recently notified the landowners the water was safe to drink. There are no federal or state standards for hexavalent chromium. Lawmakers say the pending legislation will clear up any confusion. “They scared these folks erroneously,” Rep. Pat McElraft said. “Everybody thought Duke was poisoning them when they weren’t.”
More: WRAL
OHIO
Supreme Court Upholds Part of 2012 AEP Rate Case
The state Supreme Court upheld most of American Electric Power’s 2012 rate increase, remanding part of the case to the Public Utilities Commission to review if customers should receive any refunds.
The court ruled that PUCO was correct when it approved AEP’s special “capacity charge” to make the utility whole during its transition to market-based pricing.
But the court also ruled that a portion of the rate increase was a de facto “transition charge” that added up to $508 million. Some of that, it said, could be improper.
More: The Columbus Dispatch
PENNSYLVANIA
PUC Member Leaving To Take Utility Job
Public Utility Commissioner Pamela A. Witmer is leaving the commission at the end of April to become vice president of government affairs at UGI Energy Services, a company that comes under the commission’s regulation.
Witmer’s five-year term ended on April 1. A Republican who was appointed by Gov. Tom Corbett in 2011, her departure leaves an important vacancy on the commission, now split evenly between Democrats and Republicans. Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf has yet to nominate a replacement.
More: The Philadelphia Inquirer
Steam Heat Plants Come Under Scrutiny
The Public Utility Commission wants to focus greater scrutiny on the state’s three public steam heat plants.
The plants produce and deliver steam heat through pipes to business districts in Philadelphia, Harrisburg and the North Shore of Pittsburgh.
Citing the risk for accidents and a thin oversight staff at the plants, the PUC is releasing proposed regulations that will call for more inspections and reporting of steam leaks and emergencies.
More: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
TEXAS
Hunt Group Asks for Rehearing in Oncor Purchase
The Hunt Group, the would-be buyers of Oncor, are trying to change the terms of a contentious agreement it hammered out only a month ago with the Public Utility Commission. The request for a rehearing offered a bleak assessment of the sale going through.
Minutes after the Hunt Group filed a formal request for a rehearing, PUC staff filed a statement that said the group’s separate application for a rate-setting procedure failed to meet legal requirements necessary to allow the sale to go forward. Legal deadlines loom that could make it difficult to close the purchase. The commission will meet to consider the rehearing on May 4.
The buyers want to split Oncor into two linked companies that could take advantage of a $250 million federal tax break.
More: The Dallas Morning News
Fort Worth to Oncor: Defend Your Rates
The Fort Worth City Council unanimously approved a resolution directing Oncor to explain why its electric transmission and distribution rates should not decrease if its federal tax bill drops under its bankruptcy reorganization plan.
The resolution stems from last month’s approval by the state Public Utility Commission of the Hunt Group’s $18 billion acquisition of Oncor. The PUC last month deferred a decision on the rate question until 2017 at the earliest.
More: Star-Telegram
VIRGINIA
First Commercial Wind Farm Would Top North Mountain
Apex Clean Energy is applying to site 25 wind turbines atop North Mountain in Botetourt County in what would be the state’s first commercial wind farm.
The Department of Environmental Quality has expressed support for the project, though opponents worry that the 550-foot-tall towers and rotating blades might kill birds and bats or contribute to erosion that would contaminate streams.
More: The Roanoke Times
Richmond Opposes FERC Permit for James River Hydro
The city of Richmond is fighting a company’s attempt to install an 8-MW hydroelectric project at Bosher’s Dam on the James River, saying the generator’s intakes could interfere with fish migration.
Energy Resources USA has filed a request with FERC to give it “priority of licensing” for the hydro project but is not yet seeking a construction permit. It is proposing to divert water at the existing dam through four 2-MW turbines.
The city said the hydro project’s proximity to a fishway might impair fish migration. “The documentation shows the intake for the facility immediately upstream of the ladder, which will adversely impact the function of the ladder,” wrote Patrick Bradley, the city’s water quality manager. “Also, the facility will effectively cut off access to the ladder for operation and maintenance purposes.”
More: Richmond Times-Dispatch