The state Public Utilities Commission today toughened up its rules governing formation of local electric power buying organizations, making it more difficult for privately owned facilities to hinder their creation and operation.
The new policy was issued two months before voters decide the fate of Proposition 16, a ballot measure sponsored by Pacific Gas & Electric Co. aimed at making it more difficult to create "community choice aggregations" (CCAs) or create and expand publicly owned utilities.
Proposition 16 would require two-thirds local votes before communities could take those steps. PG&E has pledged to spend tens of millions of dollars to pass it.
By resolution, the Public Utilities Commission told private utilities that they could not allow their customers to opt out of CCA service before a particular CCA has initiated its own opt-out process, that utilities could not refuse to sell electricity to CCAs, and that they could not offer inducements to local governments to opt out of a CCA.
CCAs, a mechanism for local communities to buy power but use a private utility's distribution system, were authorized by 2002 legislation, specifically aimed at a movement then underway in Marin County.
PG&E fought the Marin CCA and only recently resolved its dispute with the co-op. The utility also beat back a recent effort to expand the Sacramento Municipal Utility District into Yolo County.
"What we've done today is ensure that utilities do not solicit or accept opt-out requests until the necessary information for an informed decision is made available to customers through the initiation of the notification period provided by our Public Utilities Code," said CPUC President Michael R. Peevey. "The decision also promulgates rules preventing utilities from refusing to sell electricity to CCAs and from offering goods, services, or programs as an inducement for a local government not to participate in a CCA."
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