Bill Text: CA SB356 | 2017-2018 | Regular Session | Introduced

California Senate Bill 356 (Prior Session Legislation)

NOTE: There are more recent revisions of this legislation. Read Latest Draft

Bill Title: Energy data transparency.

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 2-0)

Status: (Engrossed - Dead) 2017-09-01 - September 1 hearing: Held in committee and under submission. [SB356 Detail]

Download: California-2017-SB356-Introduced.html

CALIFORNIA LEGISLATURE— 2017–2018 REGULAR SESSION

Senate Bill

No. 356

Introduced by Senator Skinner

February 14, 2017

An act to amend Section 1 of Chapter 469 of the Statutes of 2010, relating to energy.

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST

SB 356, as introduced, Skinner. Energy storage systems.

Under existing law, the Public Utilities Commission has regulatory authority over public utilities, including electrical corporations. Existing law requires the commission to open a proceeding to determine appropriate targets, if any, for each load-serving entity, as defined, to procure viable and cost-effective energy storage systems to be achieved by December 31, 2015, and December 31, 2020.

This bill would make a nonsubstantive change in legislative findings and declarations adopted with the above-described energy storage system requirements.

Vote: MAJORITY Appropriation: NO Fiscal Committee: NO Local Program: NO

The people of the State of California do enact as follows:

SECTION 1.

Section 1 of Chapter 469 of the Statutes of 2010 is amended to read:

Section 1.

The Legislature finds and declares all of the following:

(a) Expanding the use of energy storage systems can ~~assist~~ help electrical corporations, electric service providers, community choice aggregators, and local publicly owned electric utilities in integrating increased amounts of renewable energy resources into the electrical transmission and distribution grid in a manner that minimizes emissions of greenhouse gases.

(b) Additional energy storage systems can optimize the use of the significant additional amounts of variable, intermittent, and offpeak electrical generation from wind and solar energy that will be entering the California power mix on an accelerated basis.

(c) Expanded use of energy storage systems can reduce costs to ratepayers by avoiding or deferring the need for new fossil fuel-powered peaking powerplants and avoiding or deferring distribution and transmission system upgrades and expansion of the grid.

(d) Expanded use of energy storage systems will reduce the use of electricity generated from fossil fuels to meet peak load requirements on days with high electricity demand and can avoid or reduce the use of electricity generated by high carbon-emitting electrical generating facilities during those high electricity demand periods. This will have substantial cobenefits from reduced emissions of criteria pollutants.

(e) Use of energy storage systems to provide the ancillary services otherwise provided by fossil-fueled generating facilities will reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and criteria pollutants.

(f) There are significant barriers to obtaining the benefits of energy storage systems, including inadequate evaluation of the use of energy storage to integrate renewable energy resources into the transmission and distribution grid through long-term electricity resource planning, lack of recognition of technological and marketplace advancements, and inadequate statutory and regulatory support.