In its annual review of renewable energy compliance efforts by Wisconsin electric providers, the Public Service Commission has determined that Wisconsin has exceeded the 10% renewable portfolio standard (RPS) once again in 2014, a year before the 2015 deadline.
This standard led to an estimated $2.3 billion dollars of investment in clean power, creating jobs and strengthening our economy.
Meeting this standard is a success for Wisconsin and should be celebrated. However, we need to explore new and expanded policies that can help us compete with our neighboring states on renewable energy.
Electric providers were required to increase the amount of electricity from renewables per the RPS. In aggregate, a statewide goal of 10% by 2015 was established. As seen in the list below, most of the major electric providers are well-positioned to meet their 2015 requirements, with only two falling a bit short.
Wisconsin Electric Provider Renewable Energy Compliance
Report – 2014
Electric Provider
2014 RE Supply as a percentage of 2015 requirement
WPPI
Energy
159%
Dairyland
Power Cooperative
152%
Xcel
– NSPW
152%
Madison
Gas & Electric
137%
Alliant
– WPL
124%
We
Energies
96%
Wisconsin
Public Service
93%
According to the report, “Collectively, electric providers
have built enough renewable facilities and procured enough power
purchase agreements and bankable renewable energy credits to easily remain in compliance
through 2020 and likely beyond.”
As indicated in the table below, a little over half (52%)
of the renewable electricity supplying WI utilities is generated in other
states. Wind accounts for 63%, followed by hydro at 21.2% and biomass (wood, biogas, landfill gas, and other) at just shy of 16%.
Renewable energy resource and areas of origin
Percentage of statewide utilityRE supply
Wind
(out-of-state)
45%
Wind
(in-state)
18%
Hydro
(in-state)
17%
Biomass
(in-state)
13%
Hydro
(out-of-state)
5%
Biomass
(out-of-state)
2%
Tom Content of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel wrote an article
last week on how other states are pursuing even greater Renewable
Energy Standards, and that Wisconsin is lagging behind. We will continue to advocate for increased clean energy development in Wisconsin so that more investment will be brought to Wisconsin companies and Wisconsin workers, making the Badger State a better place to live now, and in the future.
Governor Walker signed the State of Wisconsin’s 2015-2017 Budget into law on July 12, 2015.
There were five issues or potential issues that could have negatively affected renewable energy in Wisconsin.
At this juncture, RENEW feels like renewable energy got victories in 3 issues, a partial victory on a fourth, and a definite loss with the funding cut to intervenor compensation.
Let’s start with the victories:
1. Victory: Focus on Energy
Rumors swirled that changes to Focus on Energy, the state’s program for energy efficiency and renewables, could be introduced in the
budget, but they were not. This is a significant victory in itself.
However, there may remain desire from some legislators to make changes
to Focus on Energy and we will be following that closely as the
Legislative session continues.
2. Victory: A provision that would have eliminated the need for the University of Wisconsin system to purchase renewable energy credits was introduced by the Governor as part of the creation of a separate UW Authority. When the Authority idea went down, so did this provision. Great news!
4. Partial Victory: Gov. Walker proposed up to $250,000 for the Public Service
Commission (PSC) to study “health issues related to wind energy systems”
and to prepare and submit a document reporting its findings to the
Governor and the Legislature.
The Joint Finance Committee stripped the funding for this study (that’s the partial victory portion), but still directed the PSC to conduct the study of health issues, even though the Wind Siting Council had just completed this in 2014. With no funding allocated at this time, it is not clear how the PSC intends to carry out this directive.
5. Definite loss: An amendment to the budget slashing the amount of funding for citizen groups like RENEW and the Citizens Utility Board desiring to intervene in utility proceedings before the Public Service Commission. Intervenor compensation is supported through utility revenues, not general purpose revenues. In addition to reducing the annual allocation from $1,042,000 to $371,000, the amendment also would have required intervenor groups groups to pay half the cost of their expert witnesses and legal counsel.
The Governor helped somewhat as he vetoed the Legislature’s attempt to place restrictions on funds used to intervene in PSC proceedings.
However, the Governor cannot use his veto pen to undo funding cuts
passed by the Legislature. For the next two years at least, intervenor
compensation awards will be capped at one-third the level they had been
in previous years. Legislative action is needed to restore any funding.
RENEW issued a press release on July 9th criticizing the Legislature’s damaging cuts to the
intervenor compensation program. Our release states: “By weakening citizen and small business representation before the PSC, Wisconsin’s legislature is effectively flashing a green light to utilities to come in with higher charges and new taxes to collect more money from customers and take away their ability to control their electricity usage.”
A lively exchange on the deteriorating regulatory climate for low electricity users and customer-generators is unfoldingin the Stevens Point Journal.
On the eve of this year’s Energy Fair, Midwest Renewable Energy Director executive director Nick Hylla kicked off the exchange with a guest column surveying the damaging effects of rate restructuring. Two weeks ago, the Journal published a letter from Mark Meyer, a former PSC Commissioner and the executive director of a utility front group called Fair Rates for Wisconsin’s Dairyland (FRWD), In addition to dismissing the MREA as a special interest group, Meyer’s letter defended the utilities’ rate restructuring proposals and endorsed the solar taxes approved last year by the Public Service Commission. The most recent person to enter the fray is RENEW’s Michael Vickerman, who weighed in with a stinging rebuttal to Meyer, which appeared in print a few days ago (see below). Enjoy.
EDITOR: Mark Meyer’s recent guest column in the Stevens Point
Journal (“Yes, rate hikes for solar make sense“) is
the latest example of a pro-utility hit piece where the author assails solar
energy with conjecture but fails to present any numerical evidence documenting
the supposed problem that’s got him so excited.
What Meyer didn’t convey to the reader is that his organization
is a newly formed special interest “front group” funded by monopoly
utility companies including Wisconsin Public Service and We Energies. These
entrenched utilities have a fully vested interest in bottling up competition
from rooftop solar.
When Meyer was a utility regulator, he would have demanded to
see the numbers that prove how the costs and benefits of solar energy stack up.
Now, as a cheerleader for the state’s largest electric utilities, he doesn’t
have to, preferring instead to toss out specious claims in sentences that begin
with “utilities believe” and “they contend.”
Unlike Wisconsin, numerous other states, including Vermont,
Mississippi and Minnesota, have regulators or state legislatures that insisted
on impartial, independent analysis to document the costs and benefits of solar
energy generated by electricity customers.
The result: Solar energy has been shown time and again to
deliver benefits that equal or exceed the costs to utilities. In some cases it
is the solar customers who aren’t receiving proper compensation for the
benefits they provide to the utility and other customers.
Instead, Wisconsin regulators authorized We Energies, the
state’s largest monopoly electricity provider and a principal backer of Meyer’s
group, to levy a hefty tax on customer generation of renewable electricity
beginning next year. And what does that penalty look like? As it stands today,
that tax would siphon off one-third of a customer’s savings from a solar system
and redirect it into We Energies’ coffers.
As long as Mr. Meyer continues to advance the narrow aims of
for-profit monopolies, his professed support for “the expansion of
distributed generation” lacks credibility.
Michael Vickerman,
Madison
The writer is program and policy director of
RENEW Wisconsin, online atwww.renewwisconsin.org.
Buried in
the recently passed State of Wisconsin budget are funding cuts that will hobble
citizen watchdog groups in their fight against utility proposals to increase charges
and rates as well as impose hefty taxes on customers who generate electricity
from clean energy sources.
The
2015-2017 budget eliminates a competitive Public Service Commission (PSC) annual
grant of up to $300,000 in utility ratepayer funds. Over the last five years that
grant has gone to the Citizens Utility Board, a citizen group that advocates on
behalf of small customers. The budget also cuts in half a fund for groups like
RENEW Wisconsin that intervene in rate cases and power plant proceedings, and forces
them to pay half the cost of their expert witnesses and legal counsel.
The funding
cut for citizen groups comes at a time when Wisconsin utilities are seeking
approval from state regulators for another round of increases in their base
monthly charges.
“Wisconsin
utility customers now pay the highest electric bills in the Midwest,” said
Tyler Huebner, executive director for RENEW Wisconsin. “By weakening citizen
and small business representation before the PSC, Wisconsin’s legislature is effectively
flashing a green light to utilities to come in with higher charges and new
taxes to collect more money from customers and take away their ability to
control their electricity usage.”
“Thanks to
the sharply higher customer charges and new clean energy tax approved for We
Energies last year, Wisconsin is now an outlier relative to our neighboring
states,” Huebner said. “Unless these provisions are changed by Governor Walker,
the Legislature’s ill-considered action will surely likely take us further down
an economically unproductive path.”
Huebner
added: “To put this funding reduction in perspective, the five investor-owned
utilities collect $6 billion from their customers a year. But not one dime of
the annual $671,000 cut from this program will be returned to customers. Utilities
can continue spending hefty amounts on their own attorneys and experts, all at
customers’ expense. Meanwhile, the cost of electricity service in Wisconsin
keeps going up, which puts us at a competitive disadvantage and is becoming a
serious liability to the state’s economy.”
A new video on the Sisters of St. Francis’ 100 kW PV array, which has operated for more than a year now, has been published. A dedication ceremony was held June 18th at their array in Green Bay, which included a blessing of the panels by the local bishop. Werner Electric, the company that supplied the solar equipment to the array’s contractor, Eland Electric funded the production of this video. Thanks to Jesse Michalski of Eland Electric for sending the link to RENEW.
In this powerful affirmation of solar energy, the Sisters claim “we want to be proactive in how we can make the world a better place.” At the ceremony, the Sisters highlighted the installation’s performance in its first year. The array avoided 92 tons of carbon emissions and 13,000 gallons of gasoline, while saving the convent $12,500.
The wind industry received some good news yesterday from a most unlikely source–Wisconsin state government—when the state’s Supreme Court affirmed the wind siting rule (PSC 119) that’s been in effect since March 2012. The ruling closes the four-year long legal challenge to the wind siting rule waged by the Wisconsin Realtors Association and the Wisconsin Builders Association.
The wind siting rule, which was promulgated by the Public Service Commission (PSC) in December 2010, specifies the strictest siting requirements that a local government can place on a wind energy installation up to 100 MW in size. The relators and builders filed a lawsuit in 2011 to invalidate the rule, contending that the PSC failed to consider the impact of wind generation on the state’s housing market. But their argument failed to persuade a Brown County circuit court, and that judge’s decision was upheld twice, first by the Court of Appeals and, finally, the state Supreme Court on a 5-2 vote.
As Tom Content’s article in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel points out, the decision will have no immediate effect on windpower development in Wisconsin, as there are no pending projects under review by a local government, nor are there any under construction. As the table below demonstrates, wind development in Wisconsin lags behind neighboring states by a substantial margin.
Sources: American Wind Energy Association, RENEW Wisconsin
Imagine an electric utility that packages energy makeovers for its residential customers, who can obtain substantial savings from air-source heat pumps and solar electric systems which are paid for under a lease. Imagine an electric utility that builds a microgrid powered exclusively by solar energy and battery storage, with no fossil fuels. Imagine an electric utility that is deploying digital technology to shave peak usage and passing those savings to its customers. Imagine an electric utility that is doing all those things while reducing energy rates and meeting corporate revenue targets.
That company is Green Mountain Power, an investor-owned electric utility in Vermont serving roughly the same number of customers as Madison Gas & Electric. At the same time most power companies are striving to slow down innovation, thwart conservation through restructured rates and charges, limit customer choices, and, in the case of We Energies, tax customers for using solar energy, Green Mountain Power is bucking the trend and embracing innovation and customer choice. You can read about its efforts to adapt to a changing world in a must-read article written by Bill McKibben in the June 29th issue of The New Yorker.
“A challenge in the utility culture is precisely that it’s built on guarantees,” says Green Mountain CEO Mary Powell. “Innovation happens when there are no guarantees.”
Imagine another U.S. utility CEO saying anything
like that in public.
One aspect of Green Mountain Power not noted in
McKibben’s article is that it is the only electric utility that a
certified benefit corporation, or B-corporation. As explained in
Wikipedia, a benefit corporation or B-corporation is a “type of for-profit corporate entity, legislated in 28 U.S. states, that includes positive impact on society and the environment in addition to profit as its legally defined goals. B corps differ from traditional corporations in purpose, accountability, and transparency, but not in taxation.”
Why did Green Mountain Power elect to become a B Corp? Here’s what they said: “We became a B Corp to demonstrate our deep commitment to creating positive change in the community and the environment through our work to make clean energy more affordable and reliable. We embrace the mission to ‘do good’ in all things we do, put customers first, and seek to make Vermont and the world a healthier place to live. We are very honored to be the first utility to receive the distinguished B Corp certification.”
Mary Powell will be a featured speaker at RENEW Wisconsin’s 5th
annual Energy Policy Summit, set for Thursday, January 21st in Madison. Come to the summit and learn how she and Green Mountain Power are redefining success in the electric power industry.
On the same day–June 18, 2015–the Vatican released Pope Francis’s encyclical on climate change, more than 25 people gathered at Sisters of St. Francis of the Holy Cross in Green Bay and took part in dedicating their year-old, 100-kilowatt solar installation. Bishop David Ricken presided over the ceremony, which was highlighted by the singing of “Canticle of the Sun” and the sprinkling of holy water on the panels.
Designed and built by Green Bay-based Eland Electric, the Sisters’ 416-panel array is situated at the edge of a prairie garden about 400 feet from the Motherhouse. A circular walking path cuts a sinuous path through the wildflowers adjacent to the array. Along the path are seven metal plaques explaining how solar generation works and discussing the reasons behind the Sisters’ decision to own one of the largest solar arrays in northeast Wisconsin.
Information on the installation’s benefits and performance to date is accessible at the Sisters’ web site http://www.gbfranciscans.org/justice–peace/solar-energy-tour. The array has generated 155 megawatt-hours of electricity since being energized in June 2014. On a sunny summer day, the system should produce more than 700 kilowatt-hours of electricity. It is sized to supply about 30% of the electricity used at the Motherhouse each year.
Sister Donna Koch
Many donors contributed to this project, which is dedicated to the memory of anchor donors Evaleen and Joseph Neufeld. A significant cash award from Focus on Energy played a critical part in funding this installation. The Sisters expect to fully recoup their investment in 10 years.The array is open to self-guided tours weekdays from May to October. Hours are 10:00 AM to 3:00 PM. Groups of four or less do not need an appointment to visit the array. However, groups of five or more, including school groups, must call ahead for an appointment.
Michael Vickerman, RENEW Wisconsin’s Program and Policy Director, spoke in Pepin, WI on Saturday May 30th at a Solar Workshop. Michael’s presentation, titled “All Aboard the Solar Train,” discussed solar happenings in Wisconsin, and how to continue its growth here in the state. The workshop featured other experts in the solar industry, and was a great day of learning and networking.
Leading up the event, Eau Claire news affiliate WQOW produced a great video on solar projects in Pepin County, and how the owners have benefited from it.
On May 14th, Racine, WI-based SC Johnson was honored by the World
Environment Center as the recipient of the 2015 Gold Medal for International
Corporate Achievement in Sustainable Development.
This is a major award amongst large multi-national
companies, and only one company is recognized each year. SC Johnson became the second company to win
the award twice, after first receiving the award in 1994. Recipients from
recent years include Volkswagon Group, Unilever, IBM, and Wal-Mart Stores.
SC Johnson’s global renewable energy initiatives poster
With financial support from SC Johnson, I attended the event
in Washington, DC to help honor the company.
RENEW’s relationship with SC Johnson started about four years ago, when our
Program and Policy Director Michael Vickerman advised the company as it was
pursuing the installation of two wind turbines to help power Waxdale, one of
its major factories in Mt. Pleasant, Wisconsin, near Racine.
CEO Fisk Johnson proudly supporting clean energy
Fisk Johnson, the 5th generation CEO of the family-owned
company, was on hand to receive the award.
“Reaching for that ideal of trust and goodwill is what motivates us at
SC Johnson, and it’s where we find our best answers and greatest
successes. This recognition today, which
I accept with great pride on behalf of all of the people in our company,
inspires us on even more.”
U.S. Representative Paul Ryan presented the award to Fisk
Johnson, and he highlighted their investment in renewable energy resources
including landfill gas and wind turbines. Ryan said, “If you drive by Waxdale,
you see a capped landfill with the methane running into the generators, along
with the two windmills, making sure that they are purely 100% sustainable for
their factory producing these wonderful products. That just shows you how committed this family
is, and this company is, to this mission.
It’s really impressive.”
To view (most of) Paul Ryan’s remarks, check out this video:
According to SC
Johnson, Waxdale produces an average of 100 percent of its electrical energy
onsite each year. Glade®,
Windex®, Pledge®, Scrubbing Bubbles®, Shout®, Raid® and OFF!®
are all among the trusted household products made at Waxdale.
In its annual review of renewable energy compliance efforts by Wisconsin electric providers, the Public Service Commission has determined that Wisconsin has exceeded the 10% renewable portfolio standard (RPS) once again in 2014, a year before the 2015 deadline.
