BILL ANALYSIS
Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
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| |80(Havice) |
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|Hearing Date: 8/5/02 |Amended: 6/25/02 |
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|Consultant: Lisa Matocq |Policy Vote: E, U & C |
| |8-0 |
| | |
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BILL SUMMARY: AB 80 authorizes the cities participating in
the Magnolia Power Project to aggregate their electricity
loads and provide direct access to their residents.
Fiscal Impact (in thousands)
Major Provisions 2002-03 2003-04
2004-05 Fund
DWR Potential unknown unrecovered
costs, Special*
to be offset by cost recovery mechanism
PUC Probably not substantial costs. Costs
Special**
should be offset by fee revenues.
*Electric Power Fund
**Public Utilities' Reimbursement Account
STAFF COMMENTS: In community aggregation, a city or county
(or other specified entity) may purchase electricity on
behalf of, and provide it directly to, its residents.
Investor-owned utilities customers' right to obtain power
from alternate providers was suspended in 2001, in order to
ensure a sufficient revenue stream to cover the costs of
the Department of Water Resources' (DWR) power purchasing
program.
This bill authorizes cities participating in the Magnolia
Power Project to aggregate their load and provide direct
access to their residents. The power plant project is
pending approval by California Energy Commission, and is
intended to generate additional resources for five cities
(Anaheim, Colton, Glendale, Burbank, and Pasadena) and to
accommodate the loads of two other cities (San Marcos and
Cerritos). Most of the residents of San Marcos and
Cerritos currently receive their electricity from Southern
California Edison. Because the five cities are already
operating municipal utilities, the bill effectively
authorizes the cities of San Marcos and Cerritos to act as
community aggregators and provide direct access to their
residents.
The bill requires the PUC to develop a cost recovery
mechanism for DWR's uncollected costs, including financing,
of providing service to those customers who subsequently
receive service from the cities of San Marcos and Cerritos.
Staff notes that a prior and unrelated version of this bill
was held on this Committee's Suspense File last year.
AB 117 (Migden), pending in this Committee, establishes a
general exception to the direct access suspension for
community aggregation by cities and counties serving their
own residents. A number of other bills would establish, to
some extent, exceptions to the direct access suspension.