Staff has been reviewing proposed legislation to determine potential impacts to the department.  Key energy-related issues carried over from last legislative session remain big topics from various stakeholder groups.  In addition, the new session brings potential significant energy legislation that the department is monitoring:     

Regionalization

• AB 813 (Holden) Multistate Regional Transmission System. (Watch)

  Prohibits an electrical transmission facility owner, a retail seller of electricity, or a local publicly owned electric utility from participating in a multistate regional transmission system organization unless the bylaws meet certain requirements.  If approved, this proposal would lay the groundwork for potential expansion of the California Independent System Operator (CAISO) into a larger regional entity.           

  The City is watching this bill to determine any potential costs or opportunities that could impact the City and its customers.   

   

   

Protecting Public Investments

• SB 1110 (Bradford) Natural Gas-Fired Power Plants. (Support)                                                                                    State renewable portfolio standard mandates may have long-term impacts to the operations of natural-gas generation facilities throughout California. This bill would allow a local publicly owned electric utility, upon submitting specified findings to the California Energy Commission, to additionally adopt that mitigate against the loss of public revenues from decreased generation from a power plant. 

  The City supports this bill because it addresses potential future challenges for utilities that made prudent investments in high-efficiency gas-fired power plants.  This bill may provide some cost relief if generation operations are reduced.

   

   

• AB 2693 (Quirk) Natural Gas-Fired Power Plants. (Watch) The bill would require the Public Utilities Commission to analyze and determine which natural gas-fired electric-generation power plants in existence at the time of the analysis are needed to ensure long-term electric reliability in the state. Requires the commission to direct electrical corporations to contract for those electrical services with those power plants determined to be necessary and to authorize the electrical corporations to recover the costs. 

  The City is watching this proposed legislation to determine any potential impacts to natural gas-fired power plants throughout the state.

   

   

Hydropower RPS Eligible

• AB 2809 (Patterson) Large Hydropower Renewable. (Support)

• AB 2814 (Gray) Large Hydropower Renewable. (Support)

  These two bills would revise the definition of an eligible renewable energy resource for the purposes of the California Renewables Portfolio Standard Program to include hydroelectric generation facilities greater than 30 megawatts. 

  The City supports these bills because it encourages the use of low cost, carbon-free, reliable power for our customers and these resources help meet the state’s greenhouse gas emission reduction goals.

   

   

  Outage Prevention

   

• AB 2450 (Quirk) Electrically Conductive Balloon: Manufacturer Label (Support)

  This bill would require a person who manufactures a balloon that is constructed of electrically conductive material and filled with a gas lighter than air to permanently mark each balloon with a printed statement that warns the consumer about the risk if the balloon comes in contact with an electrical power line.

  The City supports this bill as it would reduce power outages which help maintain reliable power to our customers.

   

  Federal Issues

   

• Privatization of the Power Marketing Administration Assets.  The federal administration’s budget proposes to divest the transmission assets.  The president’s “Infrastructure Plan” also requests the authority to privatize these transmission assets.  There are potential cost impacts to the department.

   

• Hydropower Licensing Reforms.  These legislative proposals would increase the capacity and generation of clean, renewable hydropower that would improve environmental quality in the United States. 

   

  • US HR 3043 (Rodgers)

  • US S 1460 (Murkowski)

     

• Wireless Communication Deployment on Public Infrastructure.  There are plans at the federal level to preempt municipal pole-attachment regulations with the goal to deploy small cell equipment on public infrastructure without local participation.  The department is concerned about maintaining local control over this issue to ensure that infrastructure, costs, and revenues issues are appropriately addressed.

   

Conclusion

Staff continues to be very active in working with its coalition partners to address key issues at both the State and Federal level.  Staff will continue to bring forth key energy-related issues to the committee as they develop.

The costs of these activities are contained within the City’s current budget. 

The activities detained in this report will not result in job development or creation.

The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) does not apply to activities that will not result in a direct or reasonably foreseeable indirect physical change in the environment (CEQA Guidelines §1506(b) (3).  The action of reviewing proposed CEQA legislation does not include the potential for a significant environmental effect, therefore is not subject to CEQA.

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Rob Jensen, City Manager