“To the state’s investor-owned utilities, Pacific Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric, CCAs are an existential threat to their business models — a mechanism that takes away their customers, while leaving them with the burden of managing the power lines, maintenance crews, and the customer service platforms that keep the system running. How those costs are shared between CCAs and utilities has been a longstanding point of contention between the two, with the California Public Utilities Commission serving as the referee.
Last week, the CPUC adopted a resolution that will force future CCAs to take up at least one part of this common burden — resource adequacy, or the need to procure enough energy to meet the grid’s need when energy demand is peaking.
When CCAs were few and small, that wasn’t such a big problem. But the exploding number and size of CCAs over the past two years have led to a significant cost shift from CCAs to the utilities, according to the CPUC’s resolution.”
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