Electricity: microgrids.

Under existing law, the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) has regulatory authority over public utilities, including electrical corporations. Existing law authorizes the PUC to fix the rates and charges for every public utility and requires that those rates and charges be just and reasonable. Existing law requires the PUC, in consultation with the State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Commission and the Independent System Operator, to take specified actions by December 1, 2020, to facilitate the commercialization of microgrids for distribution customers of large electrical corporations. This bill would require each electrical corporation to collaborate with the Office of Emergency Services, and local governments and other interested parties in its service territory, to identify locations where sources of back-up electricity may provide increased electrical distribution grid resiliency. The bill would authorize electrical corporations to file applications with the commission to invest in, and deploy, microgrids to increase that resiliency, and would prohibit the PUC from approving microgrid applications that use a cost-recovery mechanism that recovers costs from all of an electrical corporation's ratepayers unless certain requirements are met. The bill would require electrical corporations to be exclusively responsible for planning for, making investments in, and operating certain energy resources that provide electrical distribution grid operations or services on an electrical corporation's side of the meter. Under existing law, a violation of any order, decision, rule, direction, demand, or requirement of the PUC is a crime. Because the provisions of this bill may require an order or other action of the PUC to implement, and a violation of that order or action would be a crime, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program. The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.