Sammy Roth

The Desert Sun

Southern California Edison and two other utilities are once again asking the California Public Utilities Commission to raise costs for new rooftop solar customers, just six weeks after the agency rejected those requests.

The utilities commission voted in January to leave the state's solar incentive program mostly in place, after months of fierce sparring between utility companies and the rooftop solar industry. Clean energy advocates cheered the decision as a major victory for the solar industry and for California's efforts to slash climate pollution, saying the utilities' proposals would have made rooftop solar too expensive for most Californians.

Now the utilities are reviving some of their proposals. Pacific Gas & Electric filed a petition on Monday urging the utilities commission to throw out its decision and start over. Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric filed a separate petition asking for several changes to the decision, including a new charge for solar-powered homes and businesses.

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Bernadette Del Chiaro, executive director of the California Solar Energy Industries Association, called the utilities' proposals "par for the course."

"There’s a part of me that's not surprised, that they are in fact escalating their attacks on rooftop solar," she said. "That said, it does leave you scratching your head a little bit, wondering what it is that they’re trying to accomplish and what is yet to come."

READ MORE: California rejects utility-industry solar plans

The utilities commission's legal division will review the requests and make recommendations to the commissioners, who will vote on whether to grant them. It's unclear why the commissioners would do something different now than they did in January, when they voted 3-2 to reject the utilities' plans.

Edison, PG&E and SDG&E have long argued that homes and businesses with solar panels aren't paying their fair share to maintain the electric grid, forcing everyone else to pay higher costs as a result. That argument forms the crux of their latest pleas as well, with Edison estimating that non-solar customers could see their bills rise by $39 per month by 2025 if solar customers aren't required to pay more. PG&E says in its filing that the overall size of the "cost shift" from solar to non-solar customers in its service territory could reach $5 billion per year by 2025.

Solar advocates say those estimates are overblown, and don't account for the many benefits rooftop panels provide for all customers, such as reducing strain on the transmission system and helping avoid the need for expensive new power lines. The commissioners weren't swayed by the utilities' arguments either, deciding they shouldn't make rooftop solar more expensive without a better accounting of its costs and benefits. They delayed any major changes until at least 2019. By that point, solar-industry officials say, rooftop systems should be cheap enough that changes to the state incentive program won't destroy the market.

For rooftop solar, one decision could change everything

Utility-industry officials are demanding changes now. SoCal Edison said in a statement that it was "compelled" to submit its petition because the commission's decision "unfairly shifts an excessive portion of the rooftop solar subsidies to SCE’s other customers, including those who can least afford it."

"SCE hopes the commission will make adjustments to this policy to allow for the continued growth of rooftop solar without unfairly transferring these costs to non-solar customers, many of whom are low income," the company said in a statement.

At stake is a program called net metering, which compensates solar-generating homes and businesses for the excess electricity they send onto the grid. Solar customers have traditionally been paid retail rates for that electricity, but Edison, PG&E and SDG&E spent most of last year calling for them to be paid at much lower rates. The utilities also proposed new fixed charges for solar customers. Edison estimated that under its original proposal, typical solar consumers would have seen monthly bills of about $135, compared to $65 under existing incentives — a difference of more than $800 per year.

The commission rejected those plans, although it did add a few new costs for solar customers, including a one-time interconnection fee that will probably fall between $75 and $150. The agency also approved new "non-bypassable charges" to help pay for programs that benefit low-income families and energy efficiency, which solar advocates estimate will amount to $8 or $9 per month to the average solar customer's bill.

READ MORE: Solar battles raging across United States

Those changes weren't good enough for the utilities. Edison and SDG&E are now urging the commission to require solar customers to pay for the upkeep of power lines. Commission President Michael Picker included such a transmission charge in his original proposed decision, but he removed it at the last minute at the urging of the solar industry. That move caused two commissioners who otherwise supported Picker's plan to vote against it, leading to the 3-2 vote in January.

One of those commissioners, Catherine Sandoval, said solar customers depend on power lines to feed them electricity when the sun isn't shining, and should pay to maintain that infrastructure just like everyone else.

"I’m really disappointed, because I was so excited at the beginning of this week to be able to support this decision," she said at the time.

Del Chiaro, from the California solar trade group, defended Picker's decision to remove the proposed transmission charge.

“Why should people who are helping reduce the need to build expensive transmission lines be paying additional fees and surcharges for those very lines?” she asked.

The new fees approved by the commission don't affect homes and businesses that have already gone solar, or that go solar before the new rules take effect. Solar-industry officials estimate that will happen for SDG&E customers in April, for PG&E customers in October and for Edison customers in early 2017, depending on how soon each utility reaches its cap for the current program.

Edison and SDG&E also want the commission to eliminate a grandfathering period that guarantees new solar customers that their rate structure won't change for 20 years after they install their panels. It wasn't clear from the utilities' petition whether they're hoping for a shorter grandfathering period, or whether they think solar customers shouldn't have any protection against changes to net metering.

Del Chiaro said the grandfathering period is critical for homes and businesses thinking about going solar because many systems take close to 10 years to pay for themselves. Without a guarantee that they'll save money in the long run, she said, many Californians would be nervous about making the up-front financial commitment.

"These are long-term investments for most consumers," she said.

Sammy Roth writes about energy and the environment for The Desert Sun. He can be reached at sammy.roth@desertsun.com, (760) 778-4622 and @Sammy_Roth.