CPUC NEM 3.0 discussion

[holeydonut]

As someone else brought up, if NEM3.0 is a bad financial deal, no one would sign up (or very little) for NEM3.0 and the IOUs still wouldn't be getting these fixed fees anytime soon anyways.

For people with large systems and very high fixed cost under it, they may leave the state or simply remove solar to avoid the fixed charges and just pay their normal energy bill monthly as that may cost less without the headache or unknown of what the fee will be later, especially if it seems like it will change yearly and any savings are negligible. Add in broken pieces out of warranty and it becomes not worth fixing at that point.

I agree this is for the IOUs to kill solar, but killing off all the jobs will lead to the 'poor' solar installers/companies protesting this so that's probably a good thing. The work will dry up instantly overnight like other states and per one of the articles, doesn't lead to any path to sustainable solar (or any solar anymore) moving forward to hit lower emissions energy policy.

The IOUs will get the fixed costs after the grandfathering on the old NEM 1.0 and NEM 2.0 rates are sunset. They don't really expect to collect much from the NEM 3.0 and NEM 4.0 cohorts. But they do want residents to stop installing new solar since the market has a glut of daytime production and not enough batteries to phase things past dusk.

In the future, the IOUs will have almost a million California homeowners (aka rich jerks as the IOUs have painted) paying wildly expensive fixed costs. They will use this implicit tax to offset the waste generated on the commercial/utility side.

A bunch of people not employed by the IOUs losing their jobs? That's a sacrifice the IOU's are willing to make.

 

[h2ofun]

The IOUs will get the fixed costs after the grandfathering on the old NEM 1.0 and NEM 2.0 rates are sunset. They don't really expect to collect much from the NEM 3.0 and NEM 4.0 cohorts. But they do want residents to stop installing new solar since the market has a glut of daytime production and not enough batteries to phase things past dusk.

In the future, the IOUs will have almost a million California homeowners (aka rich jerks as the IOUs have painted) paying wildly expensive fixed costs. They will use this implicit tax to offset the waste generated on the commercial/utility side.

A bunch of people not employed by the IOUs losing their jobs? That's a sacrifice the IOU's are willing to make.

If after 15 years they have crazy fixed costs, it might be cheaper to remove the solar and not have a monthly cost with PGE. Or, I assume someone, either Tesla or someone else will come up with a way to go non export. Or, one gets a new plan that says I got no credit for sending back. Sure makes having the 7 batteries look better than the 5 I put in.

 

[sorka]

No. Most fireplaces are very inefficient in terms of heat into the room vs heat up the chimney (and some are negative).

More importantly, burning wood kills people. So does burning coal, and probably burning gas, and nuclear power, and so forth. But burning wood produces a lot of more pollution than burning natural gas. Especially if you don't have an EPA-certified stove or insert that reburns the smoke.

Cheers, Wayne

Burning wood is carbon neutral. Burning gas is not and is killing the planet. I heat with pellets rather than propane. It's cheaper and it doesn't add to the carbon footprint anywhere near as much.

 

[sorka]

I don't think the government takes a holistic view of wood stoves. I have a non-catalytic wood stove with air injection. Not quite as clean as the catalytic system but close and I don't have to worry about replacing the catalyst. I live on 25 wooded acres. When a tree dies or falls I cut it up for firewood. If I didn't burn them for heat I'd be burning them in a pile. If I leave them then they will be a fire hazard and will likely burn at some point in uncontrolled conditions. And if they wind up not burning and rotting instead then they release methane which is a worse greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.

Even if you didn't burn them in a pile, they're CO2 will be released over a few years anyways.

 

[sorka]

Yes, revoking something that was guaranteed in the tariff is simply wrong. New connection can follow new rules, but changing the 20 year guarantee to 15 years is just plain wrong.

I think the change that will revoke NEM status upon property sale is also a BIG problem. People invested their own money based on these terms. Relatively speaking, this is a small number of people. Let them ride out their terms.

Agreed. It's one thing to change the rules for new players or for players who's existing grandfathers expired, but to shorten non expired grandfathers will result in massive class action lawsuits.

 

[sorka]

I think the change that will revoke NEM status upon property sale is also a BIG problem. People invested their own money based on these terms. Relatively speaking, this is a small number of people. Let them ride out their terms.

Wait! Is this real? Are they trying to terminate NEM grandfathers upon sale of a property????? I plan to leave California in the next 10 years and that will dramatically lower the resale value of my system with my house.

 

[dailo]

Wait! Is this real? Are they trying to terminate NEM grandfathers upon sale of a property????? I plan to leave California in the next 10 years and that will dramatically lower the resale value of my system with my house.

Do you think most home owners know/care about the NEM status? When I sold my last house they only cared if the solar was a lease or not. Didn’t know or care about the size or type of system.

 

[holeydonut]

Do you think most home owners know/care about the NEM status? When I sold my last house they only cared if the solar was a lease or not. Didn’t know or care about the size or type of system.

Yeah, my real estate agent said the same thing... solar will not affect the sales price in a positive way. But having a solar loan or PPA will reduce the value of the home. Basically he was telling me that in all the years he's been selling homes here in the Bay Area, no homeowner with solar has ever reaped a positive benefit in their appraisal or transaction price as compared to a home next door that doesn't have solar.

This is kind of consistent with what a few neighbors have experienced selling homes in my subdivision. The guy with 20 owned panels on his roof sold his house for less than someone with no solar (same floorplan; 1 month apart). Turns out all buyers care about is the age of the kitchen and master bath.

And I didn't get any pickup on my refinance appraisal for having solar, batteries, or new HVAC. The guy didn't even bother writing down on the appraisal that the solar/ESS/HVAC was brand new.

 

[sorka]

Do you think most home owners know/care about the NEM status? When I sold my last house they only cared if the solar was a lease or not. Didn’t know or care about the size or type of system.

Absolutely! Why?

1. I have a spreadsheet that pulls Tesla's API data that shows to the penny how much I saved every hour of every day since I got PTO. It has hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, and lifetime savings. I saved over $4600 the first year vs not having the system. In 5 years, that number will be closer to $5500. When I sell my house, I plan to show prospective buyers how much I saved. I can't very well do that and imply they'll have a similar ROI if the system loses NEM 2 status when I sell.

2. If homes lose NEM 1 and 2 status when selling, it would be widely known very quickly by prospective buyers. Even if buyers haven't education themselves yet, buyer realtors certainly will. In the best case scenario, existing solar installations with what would have been a lengthy grandfather period remaining will be worth nothing now. In the worst case scenario, existing solar will become pariahs much like existing leases are now and with the fixed costs and now guarantee they won't go higher, it's likely that could see buyers demanding that sellers remove existing solar at their own expense. So something that would have been presentable as a $5500 / year utility savings will now be a liability that actually costs the seller to remove. Some of that may be recouped by removing the system and selling it out of state.

Honestly, if I were getting ready to move anytime in the next few years within California, this corrupt money grab by the IOUs enabled by corrupt collaborators would be one of the final straws for me to just leave sooner rather than later. I would not buy another house in California. I wouldn't be surprised to see this money grab accelerate the exodus from California that has already started.

 

[dailo]

Absolutely! Why?

1. I have a spreadsheet that pulls Tesla's API data that shows to the penny how much I saved every hour of every day since I got PTO. It has hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, and lifetime savings. I saved over $4600 the first year vs not having the system. In 5 years, that number will be closer to $5500. When I sell my house, I plan to show prospective buyers how much I saved. I can't very well do that and imply they'll have a similar ROI if the system loses NEM 2 status when I sell.

2. If homes lose NEM 1 and 2 status when selling, it would be widely known very quickly by prospective buyers. Even if buyers haven't education themselves yet, buyer realtors certainly will. In the best case scenario, existing solar installations with what would have been a lengthy grandfather period remaining will be worth nothing now. In the worst case scenario, existing solar will become pariahs much like existing leases are now and with the fixed costs and now guarantee they won't go higher, it's likely that could see buyers demanding that sellers remove existing solar at their own expense. So something that would have been presentable as a $5500 / year utility savings will now be a liability that actually costs the seller to remove. Some of that may be recouped by removing the system and selling it out of state.

Hm maybe I should have done that too to see if I could have gotten any higher offers! The couple who bought my last house didn’t even bother hooking up the solar monitoring even though I left clear instructions, guess they don’t care about monitoring the solar production like I do.

 

[sorka]

Hm maybe I should have done that too to see if I could have gotten any higher offers! The couple who bought my last house didn’t even bother hooking up the solar monitoring even though I left clear instructions, guess they don’t care about monitoring the solar production like I do.

You'd need to be proactive for sure. They probably knew they'd save money but didn't want to call you out on showing just how much as that would be a bargaining chip in your favor to bring that out in the open.

BTW, the Tesla app now does the same thing. Once I entered my custom schedule, it was within $100 of my spreadsheet. The problem with Tesla's app is that if you change the price, it retroactively changes for all time.

 

[sorka]

So can someone point out the provision that would eliminate NEM 2.0 upon the sale of a home?

 

[brian.c]

Hm maybe I should have done that too to see if I could have gotten any higher offers! The couple who bought my last house didn’t even bother hooking up the solar monitoring even though I left clear instructions, guess they don’t care about monitoring the solar production like I do.

Many people don't care about saving money. My neighbor requested the previous owner remove the entire PV system, so she could pay a little less for the house. I have no idea what the discount was, but he did pull them, and sold them for cash. My understanding though, the discount was no where near the amount he sold the system for. They were south facing, and could not be seen from the street...

 

[sunwarriors]

I think anyone here who cares about the going ons with NEM and energy/EVs/solar care. Most home shoppers/buyers now I'd assume in any hot metro market just hopes they can even get the home, let alone, don't think if it had solar, how to monitor, a lease/PPA/what, why we keep getting outbid even though we also all cash and no inspection/no contingency!?!?

Just saw some youtube vid about a home selling for like 800k over list for a place in Sunnyvale (sold for like $2.4mil?)...yeah, everyone under list prices to get more traffic, but 800k is a lot of $$ and you can most definitely go off-grid with that m000la....so solar is the least of their concerns.

Homes sell in my area for < 7 days. I assume that's true for most anything half decent/move in ready in Bay area, LA, OC, SD.

Housing market still super crazy hot. A home that sold a few doors down a few months ago is up $100k already (whatever zillow estimates are worth).

 

[h2ofun]

Do you think most home owners know/care about the NEM status? When I sold my last house they only cared if the solar was a lease or not. Didn’t know or care about the size or type of system.

Yea, that was before the 8 buck per kw monthly charge. Game changer when selling with solar

 

[miimura]

So can someone point out the provision that would eliminate NEM 2.0 upon the sale of a home?

A third party summary of the Proposed Decision made this assertion and I repeated it on this forum. I have now looked for the actual language in the Proposed Decision and I don't agree with the assertion that NEM 2.0 is lost upon sale. See page 151 of the PDF linked. My reading is that the original PTO date and 15 year truncated term will apply to subsequent customers.

Our second step is replacement of the 20-year legacy period with a 15-year legacy period for all future NEM 2.0 tariff customers. This includes residential customers who take service under NEM 2.0 after the adoption of this decision and before the sunset date, as well as customers taking control of (i.e., owning, leasing, or paying a power purchase agreement for) a residential system interconnected under the NEM 2.0 tariff, other than when the subsequent customer is the legal partner (i.e., spouse or domestic partner) of the original customer. For this latter group, the legacy period does not restart when the subsequent customer takes control of the system; the legacy period maintains its original interconnection date but lasts for 15 years instead of 20 years. For the same reasons that we require existing NEM 1.0 and NEM 2.0 tariff customers to transition to the successor tariff at 15 years, we find that 15 years is a reasonable period over which a new residential customer should be eligible to continue taking service under the NEM 2.0 tariff.

 

[getakey]

here's the part I don't understand. CA/PG&E has some of the highest Generation Costs in the US - maybe the highest. So why is it claimed that the cost of the grid is such a high percentage of the bill? Does not make sense.

Typical generation as part of utility bill:

Prices and factors affecting prices - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

Factors that affect electricity prices; costs for electricity generation, transmission, and distribution; and electricity prices for different types of customers.

www.eia.gov

 

[Redhill_qik]

here's the part I don't understand. CA/PG&E has some of the highest Generation Costs in the US - maybe the highest. So why is it claimed that the cost of the grid is such a high percentage of the bill? Does not make sense.

Typical generation as part of utility bill:

Prices and factors affecting prices - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

Factors that affect electricity prices; costs for electricity generation, transmission, and distribution; and electricity prices for different types of customers.

www.eia.gov

Distribution is a high percentage, but it doesn't exceed generation. Here is the unbundled rates for PG&E E-TOU-C.

 

[Southpasfan]

Distribution is a high percentage, but it doesn't exceed generation. Here is the unbundled rates for PG&E E-TOU-C.

View attachment 750051

I believe that's "PG&E's" breakdown.

If you look at CAISO right now, you can see the prices. With no solar today due to the storm, its at 6 cents a kwh all across the state. Google CAISO price map, it works better in friggen Bing for some reason than Chrome. On a typical sunny day its about 3 cents, rising later in the day.

There is some sort of "mark up" in the generation "rates"

 

[Southpasfan]

For that matter, its about 6 cents per kwh across the entire Western US.