Solar and wind-power entrepreneurs will get a bigger share
of California’s energy market. Construction contractors will get more
work tightening the energy efficiency of buildings. And environmentalists will
tiptoe closer to their goal of weaning the most-populous U.S. state from fossil
fuels.
California lawmakers on Friday passed a watered-down version
of what state Senate PresidentKevin de Leon had billed as part of the “most far-reaching
effort to fight climate change in the history of our nation.”
Before lawmakers
stripped out provisions including a 50 percent rollback in gasoline use, de
Leon’s bill had drawn opposition from building owners, the
oil industry, retailers and even fruit and vegetable growers.
The changes neutralized nearly all of the organized
opposition, while maintaining the support, albeit more muted, of
environmentalists.
“I can’t even say
that utility customers will be disadvantaged,” said Steve Chadima,
director of California Initiatives at Advanced Energy Economy, an association
of businesses in efficiency retrofits and solar and wind power. “If the whole
thing had passed, I might say employees of fossil-fuel companies would be
disadvantaged, but that didn’t happen here.”
The bill, which passed the state Assembly 51-26 and Senate
26-14 Friday night, requires that half of all electricity come from renewable
sources by 2030 and that building owners double energy efficiency by that year.
It goes to Governor Jerry Brown, a supporter, for his signature.
The clean energy mandate provides a potential $8.6 billion
investment opportunity for utility-scale solar projects, according to GTM
Research. That figure could vary depending on how much large-scale solar is
used to meet the goal and other factors, including projected declines in panel
prices and other renewable energy sources. The market could be as much as $10
billion based on an estimate provided by the California Solar Energy Industries
Association.
The mandate for renewable power is a “huge win” for
Californians and the state’s $11 billion solar industry, Sean
Gallagher, the Solar Energy Industries Association’s vice president of
state affairs, said in a statement. He said the future of small-scale rooftop
solar will depend on a regulatory ruling on the ability of homeowners to sell
power back to the grid.
Business groups including the California Chamber of
Commerce, the California Manufacturers & Technology Association and the California
Business Properties Association withdrew their opposition in the days before
the vote after de Leon and other lawmakers deleted the fuel-reduction mandate
and tweaked the efficiency rules for buildings.
The former version of the bill called for doubling the
efficiency of all buildings, while the bill approved Friday seeks to “double
the energy efficiency savings in electricity and natural gas end uses,”
according to a legislative analysis.
The California Business Properties Association, representing
commercial landlords, had opposed the previous version of the bill, warning
that it could drive up rents and create complexity for building owners. The
association dropped its objection after the language was changed.
Matthew Hargrove, the association’s senior vice president of
governmental affairs, said the final bill took a broader approach to energy
efficiency rather than placing all the burden on building owners.
“It is still a very aggressive goal, and it is still
something that we are concerned about assuring that our members can meet as the
program moves forward, but we look forward in working with the governor and
regulatory agencies to do our part,” Hargrove said by e-mail Friday.
For every building owner who has to spend a dollar on new
windows or ventilation systems, there’s a contractor who stands to make a buck
doing the work.
“By calling for a doubling in energy efficiency, that means
more jobs and more opportunities for consumers to participate in energy
savings,” said Steven Schiller, a Berkeley-based consultant who founded the
California Energy Efficiency Industry Council.
The big losers with the passage of de Leon’s bill are
Californians, especially in hotter inland areas, who will have to pay higher
electricity rates because of the mandate for renewable sources such as solar
and wind, according to Republican lawmakers who voted against the legislation.
“This bill will increase the cost of living for residents
who are already struggling to make ends meet,” said Assemblyman Matthew
Harper, a Republican from Huntington Beach, as the body debated the bill late
Friday. “Let’s not put more Californians into energy poverty by forcing them to
pay more just to keep the lights on.”
California’s three investor-owned utilities publicly
supported the bill. Gary Stern, senior director of energy policy for Edison
International’s Southern California Edison, said the bill would assure “safe, reliable and
affordable” power for the utility’s 5 million ratepayers. Eugene Mitchell, vice
president of state governmental affairs for Sempra Energy, noted that
electrical utilities could see a larger role in building facilities for
electric cars. Pacific Gas & Electric Co. also backed the bill.
Even with the fuel mandate out of the bill, environmental
groups cheered its passage. Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune
called it a “moment for hope and celebration” in an e-mailed statement. Sarah
Rose, chief executive of the California League of Conservation Voters, said in a statement that while she's “deeply
disappointed” that the gasoline reduction was taken out of the bill, she
nonetheless supported the bill.
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