BILL ANALYSIS
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|SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | SB 1055|
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UNFINISHED BUSINESS
Bill No: SB 1055
Author: Morrow (R)
Amended: 8/23/01
Vote: 27 - Urgency
SENATE ENERGY, U.&C. COMMITTEE : 9-0, 6/12/01
AYES: Bowen, Morrow, Alarcon, Battin, Murray, Sher,
Speier, Vasconcellos, Vincent
SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE : Senate Rule 28.8
SENATE FLOOR : 39-0, 7/21/01 (Consent)
AYES: Ackerman, Alarcon, Alpert, Battin, Bowen, Brulte,
Burton, Chesbro, Costa, Dunn, Escutia, Figueroa, Haynes,
Johannessen, Johnson, Karnette, Kuehl, Machado, Margett,
McClintock, McPherson, Monteith, Morrow, Murray,
O'Connell, Oller, Ortiz, Peace, Perata, Polanco,
Poochigian, Romero, Scott, Sher, Soto, Speier, Torlakson,
Vasconcellos, Vincent
ASSEMBLY FLOOR : 80-0, 9/14/01 - See last page for vote
SUBJECT : Public Utilities Commission: customer
priorities
SOURCE : California Association of Health Facilities
DIGEST : This bill requires the California Public
Utilities Commission (CPUC), when establishing priorities
among types or categories of electrical or gas customers
for exemption from rotating blackouts, to consider
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specified effects.
Assembly amendments make a technical change by recasting
the language.
ANALYSIS : Existing law requires CPUC to establish
priorities among the types or categories of customers of
every electrical corporation and every gas corporation, and
among the uses of electricity or gas by those customers.
In establishing those priorities, the commission is
required, among other things, to identify those customers
and uses that provide the most important public benefits
and serve the greatest public need in descending order of
priority.
This bill requires the Public Utilities Commission (PUC),
when establishing priorities among types or categories of
electrical or gas customers for exemption from rotating
blackouts, to:
1. Include as a consideration a determination of
unacceptable jeopardy or imminent danger to public
health and safety.
2. Consider the effect on nonpriority customers of
providing a high priority to some customers.
Background
Three months ago, the PUC issued a decision revising the
list of "essential customers" who are exempt from rotating
outages (D.01-05-089). The list includes essential public
services such as police, fire, hospitals, government
agencies essential to the national defense, and specified
customers who agree to reduce their usage during rotating
outages.
Category "M" Exemptions . In D.01-05-089, in addition to
establishing a revised list of essential customers, the PUC
also created a new class of "essential use" business
customers, referred to as Category M exemptions. In order
to qualify for the Category M exemption, an applicant must
demonstrate that including them in a rotating outage would
present unacceptable jeopardy, or imminent danger, to
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public health and safety. The PUC reviewed applications
from 568 skilled nursing facilities but only granted
exemptions to 88 facilities due to the commission's
requirement that the investor-owned utilities maintain at
least 40% of the electrical load in order to maintain
reliability of the electric grid. California has 1,200
skilled nursing facilities. Exempting all of these
facilities from rotating outages would, according to the
PUC, reduce by 6,000 MW the amount of load available for
rotating outages and reduce the load available to only 38%
of total load.
PUC Draft Decision to Investigate Exempting Skilled Nursing
Facilities . In a recent draft decision, the PUC decided to
further investigate the feasibility of exempting all
skilled nursing facilities from rotating outages. PUC
noted that patients in skilled nursing facilities are
particularly vulnerable, and that it may be worth
considering lowering the 40% load requirement in light of
changes in technology and risk assessment. This bill
requires the PUC to consider the negative health effects
that can be caused by rotating outages, and codifies the
PUC's Category M exemption standard with regard to rotating
outage exemptions.
FISCAL EFFECT : Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: Yes
Local: No
SUPPORT : (Verified 7/11/01) (unable to re-verify at time
of writing)
California Association of Health Facilities (source)
ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT : California's more than 1,200 state
nursing facilities (SNFs) care for the most medically
fragile of the state's population. In recent years there
has been a dramatic increase in the acuity levels of
patients in nursing homes. With an emphasis on lowering
the overall costs of health care, sicker patients are being
discharged earlier from hospitals to SNFs with increasingly
complex and difficult care needs. Also, nursing homes are
caring for more short-stay residents - categories of
patients that only a few years ago would have been in
hospitals. The average age of residents in a SNF is 85
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years old. It is common for these higher acuity residents
to be dependent on oxygen tanks, feeding tubes, drip IVs,
dialysis machines, electric therapeutic beds, and
ventilators, and to be recovering from serious medical
procedures such as a hip replacement, tracheotomy, or organ
transplant.
The health and well-being of these elderly and disabled
residents depends greatly on the facility's ability to
provide quality care in a safe, low stress environment,
which depends on temperature control, lighting, infection
control and the use of high-tech medical equipment.
Because of the fragile nature of the patient population, an
interruption in power in a SNF can result in serious injury
and/or death.
ASSEMBLY FLOOR :
AYES: Aanestad, Alquist, Aroner, Ashburn, Bates, Bogh,
Briggs, Calderon, Bill Campbell, John Campbell,
Canciamilla, Cardenas, Cardoza, Cedillo, Chan, Chavez,
Chu, Cogdill, Cohn, Corbett, Correa, Cox, Daucher, Diaz,
Dickerson, Dutra, Firebaugh, Florez, Frommer, Goldberg,
Harman, Havice, Hollingsworth, Horton, Jackson, Keeley,
Kehoe, Kelley, Koretz, La Suer, Leach, Leonard, Leslie,
Liu, Longville, Lowenthal, Maddox, Maldonado, Matthews,
Migden, Mountjoy, Nakano, Nation, Negrete McLeod,
Oropeza, Robert Pacheco, Rod Pacheco, Papan, Pavley,
Pescetti, Reyes, Richman, Runner, Salinas, Shelley,
Simitian, Steinberg, Strickland, Strom-Martin, Thomson,
Vargas, Washington, Wayne, Wesson, Wiggins, Wright,
Wyland, Wyman, Zettel, Hertzberg
NC:sl 9/26/01 Senate Floor Analyses
SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: SEE ABOVE
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