California Assembly panel approves several bills on electricity

San Francisco (Platts)--10Apr2007

A bill that would require California to have 33% of its electricity usage
come from renewable resources by 2020 is among a handful of bills that cleared
the California Assembly Utilities and Commerce Committee late Monday.

The renewable bill, AB 94, sponsored by Assemblyman Lloyd Levine, would
codify goals set by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger calling for a renewable
portfolio standard of 33% by 2020. The existing RPS is 20% from renewable
resources by 2010, with an exception for municipal utilities and irrigation
districts, which enforce their own renewables goals.

A measure that aims to boost efficiency of indoor and outdoor lighting
also cleared the committee. The aim of the bill, AB 1109, by Assemblyman Jared
Huffman is to improve the efficiency of lighting 50% by 2018. The California
Energy Commission would need to develop a statewide limit on energy
consumption from lighting. The bill, which was approved and sent to the
Assembly Environmental Safety and Toxic Substances Committee, includes
provisions calling for cuts of mercury and other toxic materials from some
lighting products.

Another Huffman bill that cleared the Utilities and Commerce Committee
would require state regulators to develop a framework to ensure that benefits
from carbon capture and underground storage technologies are "realistic and
quantifiable and enforceable," according to the lawmaker. Carbon capture and
storage technologies "are on the cusp of wide deployment" but a regulatory
framework is not yet in place, said Huffman. The bill, AB 705, would require
the California Environmental Protection Agency to develop standards for
testing and verification of the capture and storage of carbon, and closure and
decommissioning for sequestration sites. The bill will next be reviewed in the
Assembly Natural Resources Committee.

Also clearing Utilities and Commerce Committee is a bill co-authored by
Levine, who chairs the committee, and Assemblyman Sam Blakeslee, which would
require the California Public Utilities Commission and the California
Independent System Operator to study the impact on the transmission grid of
expanded use of distributed generation.

California is moving from traditional large-scale power plant operations,
"toward more of a widespread network" of distributed generation, according to
the bill, AB 578. The concern is that the grid "may not be fully prepared to
handle inconsistent surges" being dispatched from DG units to the transmission
grid, according to the bill. The bill moved to the Assembly Rules Committee.