Renewable Energy Standard Increase - SB 13-252 - Needs Your Help

Chris Shapard, CCIA

We need your help to push back on the attempts to get Governor Hickenlooper to veto SB 252.  Outside groups have waged a campaign of misinformation about this bill.  An anti-climate change think tank called the Heartland Institute, the Americans for Prosperity, and others have bought radio, television, print and internet ads against the bill.

Not mentioned in the ads is the historic rise of fossil fuel costs that always get passed onto the consumer, the recent increase in electricity costs from wholesale electricity cooperative associations due to fossil fuel costs that exceed 2% and Colorado’s success thus far with our current Renewable Energy Standard (30% by 2020 for Investor Owned Utilities and 10% for rural cooperatives).  Also, not being heard in the noise are the off ramp provisions that if a utility can’t meet its requirement under the 2% rate cap increase (an increase from the current 1%) then their requirement percentage decreases.

The 2010 Colorado Cleantech Action Plan, sponsored by CCIA, state, federal and economic development partners found that a leading driver for cleantech growth was our strong public policy accomplishments – specifically our Renewable Energy Standard.  No bill is perfect and SB 252 is no exception but it is a reasonable and important bill for the continued success of cleantech in Colorado. 

CCIA actively lobbied and testified in support of this bill to increase the Renewable Energy Standard (RES) from 10% to 20% by 2020 for cooperative electric utilities providing wholesale electricity and large cooperative electric associations with at least 100,000 meters. Consumer costs are capped at a maximum 2% annual increase (up from the current 1%) for compliance with the standard. Compliance off ramps were put in place to decrease the standard for cooperatives who can't meet the goals under the consumer cost cap.

SB 13-252 also:

• Requires 1% of cooperatives' retail sales to come from distributed generation (DG) and .75% for a cooperative with less than 10,000 meters;
  

• Expands the definition of eligible energy resources to include coal mine and landfill methane if the PUC qualifies the projects to be greenhouse gas neutral;
  

• Removes the additional RES credit for new generation built in Colorado after Jan. 1, 2015.
  

Please contact Governor Hickenlooper via phone, email or letter to express your support for SB 13-252.

Email: http://www.colorado.gov/govhdir/requests/opinion-leg.html
Phone: (303) 866-2471
Mail: John W Hickenlooper, Governor
         136 State Capitol
         Denver, CO 80203-1792