California proposes big changes to rooftop solar incentives

California officials want to slash payments for rooftop solar power, saying the changes would help the state achieve 100% clean energy while keeping the lights on, preventing electricity rates from rising and encouraging people to install batteries. Walker Wright, vice president of public policy at San Francisco-based Sunrun, the nation’s largest rooftop solar installer, was similarly displeased, saying in a written statement that Guzman Aceves’ proposal would “impose the highest discriminatory charges on solar and energy storage customers in the U.S., putting rooftop solar and batteries out of reach for countless families.” Wright also said the proposed changes are “contrary to the state’s objectives of addressing climate change and eliminating frequent blackouts” — a reference to the utility industry’s practice of shutting down the electric grid in certain places during dry, windy conditions to prevent wildfire ignitions. “The only winners today are the utilities, which will make more profits at the expense of their ratepayers.” Guzman Aceves’ proposed decision, which was released Monday, endorses the argument made by the state’s largest investor-owned utility companies — Southern California Edison, Pacific Gas & Electric and Sempra Energy — that net metering subsidizes richer households that can afford rooftop solar at the expense of lower-income households that can’t. The Utility Reform Network praised the commissioner’s proposal, too, with staff attorney Matthew Freedman describing it as “a step in the right direction” that prioritizes low-income households “who have been left behind under the current program.” Southern California Edison offered similar praise, calling the decision “a meaningful step toward modernizing California’s rooftop solar program” that will “reduce the financial burden on non-solar customers who have subsidized net energy metering.” Westlands Solar Park in the San Joaquin Valley, which is being built on retired farmland. The Save California Solar campaign, meanwhile, released a statement from Pastor William Smart Jr., president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, who described the Public Utilities Commission’s proposed decision as a “utility profit grab,” saying it would “take California back to a time when solar was a luxury for the wealthy and out of reach for our communities.” “It is a story as old as this country: A new technology is developed, programs and policies are offered to help consumers to adopt the technology and bring down the costs over time, and just when people in Black and brown communities are beginning to be able to afford the technology and benefit from it — the programs and policies are often taken away,” Smart said.