Erik Jacobson
Director
Regulatory Relations
Pacific Gas and Electric Company
77 Beale St., Mail Code B13U
P.O. Box 770000
San Francisco, CA 94177
Fax: 415-973-3582
April 1, 2021
Energy Division
Attention: Tariff Unit
California Public Utilities Commission
505 Van Ness Avenue
San Francisco, CA 94102
Subject:
Joint Comments of Pacific Gas and Electric Company and the Direct
Access Customer Coalition on Draft Resolution E-5119
Dear Energy Division Tariff Unit:
Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and the Direct Access Customer Coalition
(DACC) appreciate the opportunity to provide joint comments on Draft Resolution E-5119
(the Draft Resolution) approving PG&E’s Advice Letter (AL) 5859-E and Supplemental
AL 5898-E-A, respectively submitted July 30, 2020 and February 2, 2021. 1
PG&E and DACC’s Comments:
On March 25, 2021, PG&E and DACC met to discuss the impact of the Draft Resolution
on the 2019 Settlement Agreement Resolving the Negative Indifference Amount Balance
for Pre-2009 Direct Access Customers between Pacific Gas and Electric company (E 39
E), the Direct Access Customer Coalition, and the California Large Energy Consumers
Association (Settlement), approved in Decision (D.) 19-12-010. DACC expressed
concern that recovery of the Olsen Power Partners and Hydro Sierra contracts through
the Power Charge Indifference Adjustment (PCIA) on a non-vintaged basis violates
Section 2.1 of the Settlement. Section 2.1 states that the settling parties “agree that the
PCIA obligation for Pre-2009 vintage departing load customers terminated in the year
when the Department of Water Resources (DWR) contracts expired.” In other words, to
recover the Olsen Power Partners and Hydro Sierra contracts costs through the PCIA
from pre-2009 vintage departing load customers contradicts this Settlement term.
While PG&E maintains that Section 3.1 of the Settlement provides that the Commission’s
adoption does not constitute approval or precedent for any principle or issue in any future
proceeding, PG&E agrees that the premise upon which the Settlement was reached was
based on the parties’ agreement that the pre-2009 vintage direct access customer’s PCIA
obligation was terminated.
1
Counsel for DACC has authorized PG&E to submit these Joint Comments on their behalf.
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Joint Comments on Draft
Resolution E-5119
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April 1, 2021
The nonvintaged PCIA subaccount was established to recover costs of the new Public
Utility Regulatory Policies Act (PURPA) standard offer contract in Rulemaking 18-07-017.
In that Rulemaking, the Joint Parties 2 proposed that a non-vintaged PCIA methodology
would appropriately allocate costs without respect to when a customer departed, because
all customers benefit from the federal law that mandates this procurement, regardless of
their departure date. 3 Meanwhile, in a separate proceeding, R.18-07-003, Energy
Division was developing updates to a different PURPA program and contract – the
Bioenergy Market Adjusting Tariff (BioMAT) contract. One proposed modification was to
change the cost recovery of BioMAT contracts from the vintaged PCIA to a more equitable
mechanism. Ultimately, the Commission agreed that “BioMAT is one of the policy
programs aiming to achieve statewide air quality, climate, waste diversion, and public
safety goals” and that “[b]ecause the benefits of BioMAT program are shared by all
Californians, it is equitable that the cost of the program is shared by all Californians.” 4 In
this case, the Commission adopted broad cost recovery through the Public Policy
Program (PPP) charge to ensure all benefitting customers share the costs, rather than
continuing with the vintaged PCIA cost recovery mechanism. BioMAT contracts will now
be recovered through the BioMAT Non-bypassable Charge Balancing Account
subaccount in the PPP pursuant to PG&E’s Advice 5966-E submitted on October 1, 2020.
As stated by the Draft Resolution, “PURPA-mandated procurement provides broad policy
benefits to both bundled and unbundled customers, regardless of PG&E’s need to serve
load.” While the non-vintaged PCIA cost recovery mechanism ensures customer
indifference under Public Utilities Code Sections 365.2 and 366.3 for the PURPA
contracts, the cost allocation mechanism adopted for BioMAT PURPA contracts, via the
PPP, also achieves this objective. In other words, both accounts achieve the same
outcome of allocating costs to all customers that benefit from the policy procurement
mandate. In light of the Settlement, PG&E and DACC agree that these PURPA contract
costs are best recovered through the PPP.
A rate for the non-vintaged PCIA subaccount was not established for 2021, and thus any
contract costs assigned to that subaccount have not and will not be recovered until such
rates are developed in PG&E’s 2022 ERRA Forecast Application. Given the Settlement
and these two similar cost recovery options, PG&E will file in its 2022 ERRA Forecast
Application a proposal to transfer the costs from the Portfolio Allocation Balancing
Account non-vintaged subaccount to be a subaccount in the Public Policy Charge
Balancing Account, so that any current or future public policy costs are not recovered
from pre-2009 vintage customers through the PCIA.
The Joint Parties includes Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Southern California Edison
Company, San Diego Gas & Electric Company, APT Solar Company; ACWA; CalWEA; the
Clean Coalition; Division Solar, LLC; Poco Power, LLC; Solar Electric Solutions, LLC; and Utica
Water and Power Authority.
3
See D.20-05-006, p. 64.
4
D.20-08-043, p. 13.
2
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Joint Comments on Draft
Resolution E-5119
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April 1, 2021
While PG&E and DACC agree that modifications to the Draft Resolution are not
necessary, we wanted to document the commitments stated in these comments for each
other and the Commission in the case the Commission wished to revised the Draft
Resolution in accordance with these commitments.
Respectfully submitted,
/S/
Erik Jacobson
Director, Regulatory Relations
cc:
Edward Randolph, Director, Energy Division
Energy Division Tariff Unit
Amy Mesrobian, Supervisor, Climate and Equity Initiatives, Energy Division
Daniel W. Douglass, Counsel for DACC
Service Lists R.16-02-007, R.20-05-003
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