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testimony
California Utilities Required to Account for Global Warming Emission Costs
On December 16, 2004 the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) continued the trend of California and other states demonstrating leadership on addressing global warming by requiring the state’s electric utilities to account for the future cost of reducing carbon emissions in choosing energy sources. In voting to approve the 10-year resource plans of the state’s three largest utilities, the Commission effectively requires utilities to invest in conservation, improving energy efficiency, and developing renewable energy sources before relying on dirtier fossil sources of energy. The CPUC will now require the utilities to account for carbon and other heat-trapping gases when considering purchases from fossil fuel plants, and considers cleaner sources more cost-effective if they prevent carbon emissions at a cost of less than $8-25 per ton.
UCS advocated for the greenhouse gas hedge value at the CPUC by introducing analysis into the formal record, and also called for increased use of renewable energy in the utility resource plans. UCS requested the CPUC direct the utilities to prepare more integrated and complete resource plans that include a more robust analysis of renewable resource options to meet the State’s Renewables Portfolio Standard goals. The final CPUC decision generally agreed with UCS positions.
In these documents, UCS demonstrated the likelihood of heat-trapping gas regulations and the impact on consumers of further ignoring the risk. Consumer and environmental groups, as well as two of the utilities whose resource plans were under consideration, supported this approach. Pacific Gas and Electric, Southern California Edison, and San Diego Gas and Electric now join PacifiCorp, in Washington state, and Idaho Power Company, utilities that already voluntarily factor the cost of carbon regulations into their long-term planning activities.
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© Union of Concerned Scientists
Page Last Revised: 06/19/08 |
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in the News Room