The bill that will significantly reduce the energy credit given to homeowners with rooftop solar panels is baffling coalition electricity workers and the state’s large utilities for those who benefit from solar credits.
With signs and blows, dozens of rooftop sun owners protested outside the office of Congress member Lisa Calderon (D-Whittier).
Jim Matthews, one of the owners of the protest rooftop sun, said he suspected that he would have purchased the panel if the state had known it would reverse the incentives.
“Things like this will tear my heart,” said Matthews, who lives in Hawthorn. “I think it’s scandalous.”
Calderon worked for 25 years before being elected in 2020 for Southern California Edison and its parent company, Edison International. Her last position included managing the parent company’s political action committee.
Edison and two other large commercial utilities in the state have sought to cut down the energy credits that encouraged Californians to invest in solar panels. The rooftop system has reduced utility power sales.
“Calderon: For the people, or for Edison?” One indication followed, swayed by protesters outside Calderon’s office in the Industrial District. “Stop the revolving doors at SCE in Sacramento,” another said.
Watt solar panel installer on June 18th, 2021.
(Gary Coronado/Los Angeles Times)
Calderon told the Times where she introduced the bill because she learned that 97% of people in her district pay a higher electricity bill, as 97% of people in her district pay the remaining 3% when they send unused electricity from solar panels onto the grid.
“From a fair perspective, that’s not fair,” she said. “Everyone wants to have solar, but they need to do it in a fair and fair way.”
Calderon said Edison, Pacific Gas & Electric and San Diego Gas & Electric all sent letters in support of the bill.
AB 942 limits the energy credits provided to those who purchase the system to 10 years. Half of the 20-year period the state receives to rooftop owners. Incentives will also end if the house is sold.
Integrating efforts against the bill is dozens of environmental groups, including the Sierra Club and Environmental Working Group, pointing out that the state has said solar contracts will last for 20 years for a long time.
Also attending the protest was California Solar & Storage Assn, a trading group that represents companies selling rooftop solar systems. was the representative of. The protest was organized by the Solar Rights Alliance, a statewide association of solar cell users.
Edison spokesman Jeff Monford said the company sent a letter to Calderon on Wednesday in support of the bill. He said the bill “has nothing to do with the utility’s profits. It would lead to savings for customers.”
The company estimates that customers who do not have Solar will save $500 million by 2030 if AB 942 is passed or about 3% of the average household fee.
Unions of electrical workers who install and repair equipment built by Edison and other electrical companies are lobbying to pass the bill.
Emailed a spokesman for California ASSN. Electric workers said the group “strongly support the bill” and “reduces the financial burden of non-salt wages.”
At a meeting in Sacramento in late March, the leader of a group representing 83,000 electrical workers in the state said it was to reform the rooftop solar incentives.
“It’s unfair, unfair, unsustainable for Californians to continue to devour billions of dollars each year when Californians are not justified or fair to non-salinary clients, especially when the burden is at the most extreme for low-income clients,” electrical worker lobbyist Scott Wetch wrote in a letter to union members and the chairman of the Energy Committee.
Calderon and the electrical workers point to an analysis by the State Utilities Commission’s Office of Public Advocates. It says that the credit given to rooftop owners for electricity sent to the grid is increasing the electricity bill for customers who don’t own $8.5 billion a year on the panel.
The Rooftop Solar Industry and Environmental Group oppose the analysis and say it is flawed.
In a recent letter to the Congressional Committee, the environmental group pointed to an analysis of economist Richard McCann performing for the rooftop solar industry. The equipment includes the transmission lines needed to connect industrial-scale solar farms to the grid.
While homeowners’ solar panels helped to maintain electricity demand for 20 years, spending for three utilities on transmission and distribution infrastructure rose 300%, McCann found.
“To address rising fees, California needs to focus on what’s really wrong with its energy system: uncontrolled utility spending and record-breaking utility benefits,” the environmental group wrote.
In December 2022, the committee voted to reduce incentives for those who have installed the panels by 75% since April 15, 2023, but placed the incentives for legacy customers.
AB 942 does not apply to rooftop solar customers living in territories served by city utilities in the state, including the Los Angeles Department of Water and Electricity.
A hearing on the bill is scheduled for April 30th.
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