COMMENTS
Public Utilities Code section 311(g)(1) provides that this resolution must be served on all parties and subject to at least 30 days public review and comment prior to a vote of the Commission. Section 311(g)(2) provides that this 30-day period may be reduced or waived upon the stipulation of all parties in the proceeding.
The 30-day comment period for the draft of this resolution was neither waived or reduced. Accordingly, this draft resolution was mailed to parties for comments on October 20, 2010.
Timely comments were submitted by PG&E, DRA, IREC, Solar Alliance, FIT Coalition, Republic Cloverleaf Solar and SCE on November 9, 2010. On November 15, 2010 timely reply comments were submitted by PG&E, IREC, FIT Coalition and SCE.
Parties commented on a broad range of issues. All comments and reply comments have been carefully considered. Republic Cloverleaf Solar's comments regarding bilateral contracting are out of scope for this resolution. The principle areas of revisions in the text of the draft resolution are noted here.
We have ordered revisions to PG&E's eligibility criteria and solicitation protocols.
The discussion on the appropriate interconnection process for projects developed under this program has been revised and clarified.
The requirements for what location and interconnection information PG&E will provide has been expanded and clarified.
The discussions on the standard PPA and the annual reporting requirements have been expanded and clarified.
Additional changes and clarifications have been made to address less significant issues raised by the comments.
FINDINGS AND CONCLUSIONS
1. Pursuant to Decision 10-04-052, Pacific Gas and Electric Company is required to execute contracts through its solar photovoltaic program with independent power producers using a competitive solicitation process for 250 megawatts comprised of one to 20 megawatt solar photovoltaic facilities.
2. Pursuant to Decision 10-04-052, on May 24, 2010, Pacific Gas and Electric Company filed Advice Letter 3674-E to implement the competitively bid power purchase agreement portion of its solar photovoltaic program.
3. Decision 10-04-052 requires that Pacific Gas and Electric Company convene a program forum for participants and stakeholders within 60 days of closing the solicitation for power purchase agreements to identify program components that may need refinement. Based on the feedback received through these program forums, and in consultation with Energy Division, Decision 10-04-052 provides that Pacific Gas and Electric Company may file a Tier 3 advice letter seeking modifications to the solicitation protocols and standard contract terms and conditions adopted by this resolution.
4. It is reasonable to require a minimum level of developer experience as an eligibility criterion for the solar photovoltaic program.
5. It is reasonable to require Pacific Gas and Electric Company to take all reasonable measures to see that 250 megawatts of new solar photovoltaic projects are developed by independent power producers, consistent with Decision 10-04-052, including but not limited to, using the last year of the program to solicit for any unsubscribed capacity authorized under this program.
6. It is reasonable to use protocols in the solar photovoltaic program concerning Pacific Gas and Electric Company's right to terminate a solicitation for any reason and waiver of a program participants rights that are similar to those protocols used in Pacific Gas and Electric Company's Renewables Portfolio Standard solicitation.
7. Pursuant to Decision 10-04-052, Pacific Gas and Electric Company shall file an Advice Letter if it seeks to terminate a solicitation, suspend or scale-back the solar photovoltaic program.
8. It is reasonable to limit seller concentration in each solar photovoltaic program solicitation by limiting the number of megawatts contracted to a single seller.
9. It is reasonable to allow participants to aggregate multiple facilities that have a minimum 500 kW Gross Power Rating in order to meet or exceed the one megawatt program eligibility threshold, provided that the aggregated project interconnects within a single p-node.
10. The Commission reserves the right to consider and address interconnection issues in the future as appropriate and necessary, including, without limitation, ordering changes to solar photovoltaic program documents based on developments in or resolution of FERC Docket No. ER 11-1830-000.
11. Pacific Gas and Electric Company's election to use a particular interconnection process for the power purchase agreement program does not constitute an admission or decision by the Commission that it is the jurisdictionally appropriate or mandated process for interconnection under the power purchase agreement program.
12. It is reasonable to expect Pacific Gas and Electric Company to proactively modify its interconnection protocols for use in the power purchase agreement program where such modifications are reasonable and would enhance the implementation timelines and probability of the program's success.
13. It is reasonable to require that Pacific Gas and Electric Company proactively, or at the direction of Energy Division staff, make incremental improvements to the quality of the preferred location information provided for the first solicitation and throughout the solar photovoltaic program.
14. At this time, the evaluation methodology for selecting projects from the solicitation for power purchase agreements will not favor projects located in local capacity requirement areas identified by the California Independent System Operator.
15. It is reasonable for Pacific Gas and Electric Company to use Local Capacity Requirement designation as a tie-breaker criterion when selecting projects through the power purchase agreement solicitation process.
16. It is reasonable for Pacific Gas and Electric Company to use the same independent evaluator to oversee the annual solicitations for power purchase agreements and utility-owned generation.
17. Pacific Gas and Electric Company's confidentiality protocols are adopted to ensure that information given by developers to Pacific Gas and Electric Company through the interconnection or bidding process is not shared with Pacific Gas and Electric Company staff working on the utility-owned generation portion of the program.
18. Pacific Gas and Electric Company's standard power purchase agreement for projects between three and 20 megawatts complies with Decision 10-04-052.
19. Pacific Gas and Electric Company's protocol that requires independent power producers to make reasonable efforts to pay prevailing wage is consistent with Decision 10-04-052.
20. The risk to Pacific Gas and Electric Company and its customers for having to procure replacement power does not warrant requiring delivery term security from sellers with facilities three megawatts and smaller.
21. It is reasonable to require that Pacific Gas and Electric Company seek Commission approval of executed contracts by filing a Tier 2 advice letter.
22. Pacific Gas and Electric Company is required to file annual compliance reports with the Commission and it is reasonable for Pacific Gas and Electric Company to supplement its annual report as needed and at the direction of Energy Division.
23. Pacific Gas and Electric Company will undertake all reasonable efforts to ensure that information about its solar photovoltaic program is made available to all interested parties, including women, minority, and disabled veteran business enterprise suppliers, so that they may actively participate in the program's solicitation process.
24. Advice letter 3674-E should be approved with modifications.
THEREFORE IT IS ORDERED THAT:
1. Pacific Gas and Electric Company's advice letter is approved with modification.
2. Pacific Gas and Electric Company shall take the following actions to ensure that program forums required by Decision 10-04-052 are effective:
a. Notice all stakeholders of the date, time, location and methods for participation for each program forum;
b. Issue a request for feedback from all stakeholders after the close of each solicitation in order to inform the agenda for the program forum;
c. At the program forum, PG&E shall provide sufficient time to address key issues identified in the request for feedback and the independent evaluator's report;
d. At the program forum, PG&E shall provide sufficient time for stakeholders to discuss their experience with the solicitation or the program in general; and
e. The independent evaluator should participate in the program forum.
3. Based on feedback from the program forums, Energy Division staff may propose modifications to the protocols governing the power purchase agreement program and the standard contract terms and conditions by issuing a draft resolution on its own motion.
4. Pacific Gas and Electric Company shall remove the provision in its power purchase agreement solicitation protocols that limit the number of bids allowed by a single participant.
5. Pacific Gas and Electric Company shall revise its eligibility protocols so that:
a. A single project may be comprised of the aggregation of multiple sites to meet or exceed the one megawatt program eligibility threshold, provided that each system has a minimum 500 kilowatt Gross Power Rating;
b. A project comprised of aggregated sites interconnects within a single p-node; and
c. A minimum level of developer experience is required for participation in a power purchase agreement solicitation. Specifically: the independent power producer company and/or member of the project development team must have either completed or begun construction of solar project that is at least 500 kilowatts.
6. Pacific Gas and Electric Company shall proactively modify its interconnection protocols for use in the solar photovoltaic program where such modifications are reasonable and would enhance the implementation timelines and probability of achieving the program's goals.
7. Pacific Gas and Electric Company shall modify its solicitation protocols so that a Local Capacity Requirement designation will be used as a tie-breaker criterion when selecting projects through the power purchase agreement solicitation process.
8. Pacific Gas and Electric Company shall provide the following distribution system information, to the extent it is available at least 90 days before the second power purchase agreement solicitation opens:
· Load and generation (or net load) for each substation and each feed line circuit emanating from it, and
· Planned changes to the substation or circuit, including additional load servicing through new or upgraded facilities and queues for distributed generation applications and approved facilities.
9. Pacific Gas and Electric Company shall modify section VIII of its solicitation protocols and use the same waiver of claims and limitation of remedies protocols used for its 2009 Renewables Portfolio Standard solicitation.
10. Pacific Gas and Electric Company shall remove delivery term security provisions in its standard power purchase agreement for facilities three megawatts and smaller.
11. Within 30 days of the effective date of this resolution, Pacific Gas and Electric Company shall file a Tier 1 advice letter with the Energy Division demonstrating compliance with Ordering Paragraphs 4, 5, 7, 9 and 10 of this resolution.
12. All contracts executed under, and consistent with, the solar photovoltaic program adopted in Decision 10-04-052 and implemented by this resolution shall be filed by Tier 2 advice letter.
13. Pacific Gas and Electric Company shall prepare annual compliance reports that include, at a minimum, the information identified in Attachment A.
14. The first annual compliance report is due on March 1, 2011, as ordered in Decision 10-04-052, and Pacific Gas and Electric Company shall supplement this first annual compliance report within 30 days after filing an advice letter seeking approval of power purchase agreements resulting from a solar photovoltaic program solicitation. The second and all subsequent compliance reports shall be due 30 days after Pacific Gas and Electric Company files an advice letter seeking approval of power purchase agreements resulting from a solar photovoltaic program solicitation.
15. Pacific Gas and Electric Company shall supplement its annual report as needed and at the direction of Energy Division.
16. Pacific Gas and Electric Company's annual compliance reports, and any updates or supplements directed by the Energy Division, shall be filed and served in the proceeding for Application 09-02-019 and shall be served in the Renewables Portfolio Standard proceeding Rulemaking 08-08-009, or subsequent proceeding.
This Resolution is effective today.
I certify that the foregoing resolution was duly introduced, passed and adopted at a conference of the Public Utilities Commission of the State of California held on December 16, 2010; the following Commissioners voting favorably thereon:
/s/ PAUL CLANON
PAUL CLANON
Executive Director
MICHAEL R. PEEVEY
President
DIAN M. GRUENEICH
JOHN A. BOHN
TIMOTHY ALAN SIMON
NANCY E. RYAN
Commissioners
Attachment A
Annual Reporting Requirements
Reporting on the power purchase agreement (PPA) portion of the Solar PV Program
Solicitation Information
· Documentation of all solicitations issued for PPA projects;
· A description of the shortlist process;
· A description of all bids received from the PPA solicitations, including the name of the bidder, the project, the bid price, and a description of the proposed facility (generating capacity, type of technology, annual average expected generation, interconnection point depicted on a map), and identification of the winning bids;
· A description of all bids that were not shortlisted and the reasoning;
· Information related to General Order 156 reporting requirements.
Facility Performance Information
· The total electrical output for all PG&E Solar PV Program systems under PPAs that are currently selling electricity to PG&E, for each month of the previous year;
· A forecast of energy and capacity that will be sold to PG&E under the Solar PV Program on an annual basis throughout the contract term.
Interconnect Information
· A description of the project specific distribution and network upgrades, including costs;
· A description of any distribution and network upgrades generally needed to facilitate the PPA Program, in addition to project specific upgrades;
· A description of PPA bids and shortlisted projects rejected or projects with executed PPAs terminated because of the need for distribution or network upgrades and the projected cost of those network upgrades;
· Summary of Project Interconnection Results:
- Date the interconnection request was submitted and received;
- Date the interconnection application was deemed complete and queue position;
- Type of interconnection request;
- Key milestone dates (e.g., date of scoping meeting, date of feasibility study, system impact study, and facilities study), initial requested online date and updated requested online date (if applicable), actual online date;
- Itemized fees and costs, including study fees and upgrade costs.
General Program Information
· A comparison of bidders and bids received during the most recent PPA Program solicitation, RPS program, and any other Commission program available to projects bidding into the PPA Program to assess whether PPA projects are being bid into multiple programs;
· An Independent Evaluator report;
· A description of the items that will be discussed at the program forum.
Reporting on the utility-owned generation (UOG) portion of the Solar PV Program
Solicitation Information
· Documentation of all solicitations issued for UOG projects, including the criteria PG&E established to evaluate bids; a description of the short list of bids, including the name of each bidder and the final price in the agreement, a description of the proposed facility, including generating capacity, type of technology, annual average expected generation, and proposed interconnection point; and identification of winning bids;
· Information related to General Order 156 reporting requirements.
Project Development Information
· A description of all UOG facilities for which work has been initiated or completed in the previous year, including: capital costs, and operations and maintenance expenses, generating capacity, type of technology, annual average expected generation, description of the site (existing PG&E-owned land or newly acquired/leased land, land/lease cost, proximity to substation), and progress toward completion;
· Quantification of the UOG capacity that came online in the previous calendar year, and how much un-deployed UOG capacity will be carried forward to the subsequent year subject to the 10 megawatt (MW) carryover limit adopted by the decision;
· A forecast of the UOG energy and capacity that will be built on an annual basis throughout the contract term.
Facility Performance Information
· Forecasted and actual calculation of the levelized cost of energy (LCOE) for each UOG facility that is in development or completed and interconnected to the grid. This calculation shall include work papers showing actual amounts for all cost and electrical output entries used to calculate the LCOE;
· Electrical output by month for the previous year for each PG&E-owned UOG facility that is completed and interconnected to the grid.
Interconnect Information
· Summary of Project Interconnection Results:
- Date the interconnection request was submitted and received;
- Date the interconnection application was deemed complete and queue position;
- Type of interconnection request;
- Key milestone dates (e.g., date of scoping meeting, date of feasibility study, system impact study, and facilities study), initial requested online date and updated requested online date (if applicable), actual online date;
- Itemized fees and costs.
· Distribution and Network Upgrades
- Description of the project specific distribution and network upgrades and distribution and network upgrades generally needed to facilitate the UOG project;
- Known or projected costs of upgrades associated with interconnecting each UOG facility, including:
_ All distribution and network upgrades;
_ Identification of the UOG projects identified as triggering the need for network upgrades;
_ Identification of the UOG projects that do not trigger the need for network upgrades.
General Program Information
· An Independent Evaluator report.
1 This is consistent with the PV system capacity factor and degradation factor assumed by PG&E in its Application (A.) 09-02-019.
2 D.10-04-052, Ordering Paragraph 16.
3 PG&E should utilize telecom and web-based technologies to facilitate remote participation.
4 See, Advice Letter 3691-E. (Referred to as "technical capability")
5 See, D.10-04-052 at 54.
6 See, PG&E's 2009 RPS Solicitation Protocols, Section XVII, available at: http://www.pge.com/includes/docs/word_xls/b2b/wholesaleelectricsuppliersolicitation/2009RPS/00_2009_RPS_RFO_Solicitation_Protocol.DOC.
7 Solar Alliance response at 3-4.
8 PG&E's 2009 RPS Solicitation Protocols at Section VII.
9 AL 3674-E, Attachment A at 12, Section VIII.
10 Republic Solar protest at 3.
11 A "p-node" is a single network Node or subset of network Nodes where a physical injection or withdrawal is modeled and for which a Locational Market Price is calculated and used for financial settlements. See, e.g., http://www.caiso.com/2457/2457e07768380.pdf
12 FIT Coalition reply comments at 6-7.
13 AL 3674-E at 7.
14 PG&E response at 6.
15 Wholesale Distribution Access Tariffs provide for a streamlined interconnection process for facilities that meet certain screens. See Section 2 of PG&E's WDT: http://www.pge.com/includes/docs/pdfs/shared/customerservice/nonpgeutility/electrictransmission/tariffs/WD%20Tariff%20-%20eTariff%20Baseline%20Version.pdf (last visited on 12/13/2010). SCE used a modified fast track interconnection process for its own solar photovoltaic program.
16 D.10-04-052 at 42.
17 D.10-04-052, Ordering Paragraph 9.
18 AL 3674-E at 6.
19 Solar Alliance protest at 3.
20 DRA protest at 3.
21 PG&E response at 3.
22 PG&E response at 3-5.
23 See, e.g., D.09-06-049, Resolution E-4299, D.10-04-052 and D.10-09-016.
24 On September 2, 2010, the Commission adopted D.10-09-016, authorizing a solar PV program for SDG&E.
25 FIT Coalition comments at 4-5.
26 PG&E reply comments at 2-3.
27 DRA references the CAISO's Annual Local Capacity Technical Analysis report, which was submitted in the Commission's Rulemaking 09-10-032.
28 For example, the Commission's Smart Grid proceeding (R.08-12-009) provides an opportunity to evaluate the utilities' existing electric infrastructure.
29 DRA protest at 4.
30 PG&E response at 5.
31 DRA comment at 1-3.
32 PG&E response at 8 and AL 3674-E.
33 AL 3674-E, Attachment C.
34 D.10-04-052, Ordering Paragraph 18.
35 See August 25, 2010 proposed decision in Rulemaking (R.) 06-02-012. "Decision Modifying Decision 10-03-021 Authorizing Use Of Renewable Energy Credits for Compliance With The California Renewables Portfolio Standard And Lifting Stay And Moratorium Imposed By Decision 10-05-018."
36 CUE protest at 2-3.
37 D.10-04-052 at 59 and 63.
38 D.10-04-052 at 84 (Ordering Paragraph 19).
39 See, Rules of Practice and Procedure, Rule 16.4.
40 D.10-04-052, Ordering Paragraph 9.
41 See, Small PPA at §3.3 and §3.4; Large PPA at §3.3 and Appendix X
42 PG&E comments at 4-5.
43 We also note that the CAISO process only addresses transmission level interconnection. Many of the projects participating in the PPA Program will likely interconnect at the distribution level. It is unclear at this time what changes PG&E will have to make to its WDAT or Rule 21 interconnection tariffs to seek deliverability studies for projects interconnecting at the distribution level.
44 PG&E response at 12.
45 Provided staff does not suspend the advice letter, pursuant to General Order 96-B, Section 7.5.2.
46 See, D.10-04-052 at Ordering Paragraph 17.
47 Public Utilities Code Section 8281(a).
48 General Order 156, "Rules Governing the Development of Programs to Increase Participation of Women, Minority and Disabled Veteran Business Enterprises in Procurement of Contracts from Utilities as Required by Public Utilities Code Sections 8281-8286", current as of August 24, 2006, Rule 1.1.1.
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