SB 710 Virginia Senate · 2020 Regular Session

Distributed solar & other renewable energy; sales of electricity under third-party agreements.

Summary
Distributed renewable energy. Promotes the establishment of distributed renewable solar and other renewable energy. The measure (i) requires the State Corporation Commission to establish by regulation a shared solar program that allows multifamily customers of investor-owned utilities, other than American Electric Power, to purchase electric power through a subscription in a shared solar facility; (ii) raises the cap on the total amount of renewable energy that can be net metered in a utility's service territory from one percent to six percent, five percent of which is available to all customers and one percent of which is available only to low-income utility customers; (iii) raises the cap for net-metered nonresidential generation facilities from one megawatt to three megawatts; (iv) allows certain localities to install solar or wind facilities of up to five megawatts on government-owned property and use the electricity for government-owned buildings; (v) increases the cap on the capacity of generation from facilities from the customer's expected annual energy consumption to 150 percent of such amount for customers in Dominion Energy Virginia's service territory; (vi) prohibits standby charges for any residential customer-generator or agricultural customer-generator of an investor-owned utility other than Dominion Energy Virginia; and (vii) increases the cap on third party power purchase agreements to 500 megawatts for jurisdictional customers and 500 megawatts for nonjurisdictional customers of Dominion Energy Virginia and to 40 megawatts for customers of American Electric Power. The measure also amends the Commonwealth Energy Policy to include provisions supporting distributed generation of renewable energy. This bill is identical to HB 572, HB 1184, and HB 1647.
Bill status signed all 5 stages cleared
Introduction
Jan 2020
Committee Review
Mar 2020
Senate Passage
Feb 2020
House of Delegates Passage
Feb 2020
Signed into Law
Apr 2020
Introduced Jan 7, 2020 Signed Apr 11, 2020
Floor votes

How they voted

This bill passed the Senate. No roll call record of that vote is available.
Full legislative history

Actions timeline

Total actions
58
Key actions
15
Committee
13
Apr 11, 2020
Signed into law
Approved by Governor-Chapter 1187 (effective 7/1/20)
executive
Mar 8, 2020
Upper · Passed
Conference report agreed to by Senate (27-Y 12-N)
upper
Mar 8, 2020
Lower · Passed
Conference report agreed to by House (60-Y 31-N 1-A)
lower
Mar 8, 2020
Lower · Passed
Reconsideration of conference report agreed to by House
lower
Mar 8, 2020
Lower · Passed
Conference report agreed to by House (61-Y 32-N 1-A)
lower
Mar 7, 2020
Legislature · Passed
Amended by conference committee
legislature
Mar 3, 2020
Lower · Passed
House requested conference committee
lower
Feb 28, 2020
Lower · Passed
Passed House with substitute (64-Y 34-N 1-A)
lower
Feb 28, 2020
Lower · Passed
Engrossed by House - committee substitute SB710H1
lower
Feb 28, 2020
Lower · Passed
Committee substitute agreed to 20109142D-H1
lower
Feb 25, 2020
Lower · Passed
Reported from Labor and Commerce with substitute (12-Y 7-N)
lower
Feb 14, 2020
Committee
Referred to Committee on Labor and Commerce
lower
Feb 11, 2020
Upper · Passed
Passed Senate (22-Y 18-N)
upper
Feb 10, 2020
Upper · Passed
Passed by for the day
upper
Feb 6, 2020
Upper · Passed
Passed by for the day
upper
Feb 3, 2020
Upper · Passed
Reported from Commerce and Labor (12-Y 3-N)
upper
Jan 23, 2020
Committee
Assigned C&L sub: Energy
upper
Jan 7, 2020
Committee
Referred to Committee on Commerce and Labor
upper
Jan 7, 2020
Introduced
Prefiled and ordered printed; offered 01/08/20 20104871D
upper
1 primary · 5 co-sponsors

Sponsors