URGING EQUITABLE DISTRIBUTION OF ELECTRICITY GRID SYSTEM COSTS

WHEREAS, the U.S. electric grid delivers a product essential to all Americans;

WHEREAS, electricity runs our economy, and it powers our homes, businesses, industries, and the smart technologies, and innovations that enhance our quality of life;

WHEREAS, the United States needs a diverse supply of safe and reliable electricity;

WHEREAS, the domestic development of alternative energy sources should be concurrently beneficial to our country’s environment and to our country’s economy;

WHEREAS, the electric power industry is leading the transformation to make the grid more flexible and more resilient to meet the growing demands of our digital society;

WHEREAS, the electric power industry directly employs more than 500,000 American workers and is the nation’s most capital-intensive industry, investing more than $85 billion per year, on average, in capital expenditures, including investments in transmission and distribution infrastructure;

WHEREAS, more than 40 states, the District of Columbia, and four U.S. territories now have established policies to regulate the use of rooftop solar panels and other small-scale, on-site distributed generation (DG) systems;

WHEREAS, it is recognized that when these rooftop solar and other DG systems first came to market years ago, many states approved a billing plan called net metering to encourage their introduction;

WHEREAS, net-metered customers pull energy from the grid in the absence of sunshine, and must use the grid to feed energy back into the grid when the solar unit is generating more power than the house or business needs;

WHEREAS, some states now have net metering policies that credit rooftop solar or other DG customers for any excess electricity they generate and sell using the grid, and require utilities to buy this power typically at the full retail rate—despite the availability of lower retail rates through selfproduction or through wholesale market providers;

WHEREAS, the full retail rate of electricity often includes the fixed costs of poles, wires, meters, advanced technologies, and other infrastructure that make the electric grid safe, reliable, and able to accommodate solar panels and other DG systems;

WHEREAS, when net-metered customers are credited for the full retail cost of electricity, they effectively avoid paying the grid costs, and utilities may shift these costs for maintaining the grid to those customers without rooftop solar or other DG systems through higher utility bills;

WHEREAS, all residential and business consumers who use the electric grid should pay to support its maintenance and to ensure its reliability;

WHEREAS, shifting costs from those who can afford DG systems to less affluent customers and others unable to afford or qualify for rooftop solar leases is an unfair financial burden; and

WHEREAS, the use of rooftop solar and other DG systems now has become more widespread, and many states are reviewing their net metering polices.

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, that the National Black Caucus of State Legislators (NBCSL) encourages state policymakers to recognize the value that the electric grid delivers to all and to examine the following:

• updating net metering policies in their states so that solar customers and other distributed generation customers that use the electric grid pay a fair and equitable fee to maintain the grid and to keep it operating reliably at all times;
• whether such a fee should be charged solely to solar customers and other distributed generation customers and assessed based on their use of the electric grid;
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• policies for solar rooftop customers that distribute system costs equitably by creating mechanisms that recover grid costs from DG systems, enhance cost transparency, and determine if non-solar customers do, in fact, benefit sufficiently from the policy change; and
• ensuring electric rates are fair and affordable for all customers and that all customers have safe and reliable electricity;

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that NBCSL supports transparent subsidies to support the cost of alternative energy build out throughout the country and encourages legislators on the state and federal level to continue to encourage the implementation of cost-effective alternative energy sources;

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that NBCSL urges state and federal lawmakers to support programs that provide funding or utilize fair and equitable financing models to aid low-income households and communities to become more energy efficient and to use solar panels or other forms of alternative energy; and

BE IT FINALLY RESOLVED, that a copy of this resolution be transmitted to the President of the United States, the Vice President of the United States, members of the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate, and other federal and state government officials as appropriate.

SPONSOR: Representative Joseph Gibbons (FL)
Committee of Jurisdiction: Energy, Transportation, and Environment Policy Committee
Certified by Committee Chair: Representative Joe Gibbons (FL)
Ratified in Plenary Session: Ratification Date is December 13, 2013
Ratification is certified by: Representative Joe Armstrong (TN), President