After eight years, San Francisco is on the threshold of taking a major step into the public power realm.
The Board of Supervisors is set to consider legislation Tuesday that would allocate $19.5 million to secure a contract with Shell Energy North America to provide 100 percent renewable power to San Franciscans who want to pay a premium for it, with $2 million of that total allocated to studying local power-generation options.
The program, CleanPowerSF, is designed to build a customer base and revenue stream to lay the groundwork for city-owned renewable power generation while advancing San Francisco's aggressive greenhouse-gas reduction goals. It also would effectively break Pacific Gas and Electric Co.'s decades-old monopoly on the consumer power market in its headquarter city.
"This is about giving consumers a choice," said Supervisor David Campos, who is sponsoring the legislation. "And for the choice to be meaningful, it can't be dependent on one company deciding the energy future of this city."
If CleanPowerSF is approved, San Francisco will become the second municipality in the state to create a community-choice aggregation program after Marin County, which also contracts with Shell to provide renewable power. Such programs were made possible under a 2002 state law that allows municipalities to choose alternative electricity providers.
San Francisco has been trying to work out the details for implementing such a program since 2004, and officials ultimately shelved the idea of creating renewable-power-generating facilities simultaneously with a clean-power purchase agreement.
"This is the single biggest program that is even on the horizon within the city and county of San Francisco to make any difference toward any of the goals that you have set as board members in terms of having a change in greenhouse-gas emissions and climate change in San Francisco," Harrington told the Board of Supervisors' budget committee last week. "This program can make a dramatic change."
Under the proposal, roughly half of the city's 375,000 residential power customers would be automatically enrolled in the program to receive renewable power. Those customers would be chosen based on market research the city has already conducted showing support in neighborhoods across the city - from parts of the Richmond to Potrero Hill - for paying extra for power generated through sources like wind and solar, officials said.
Customers automatically enrolled would have five months to opt out of the program at no charge. After that, they could be charged a small fee, about $5, to leave. Other residential and commercial customers could opt in.
Mayor Ed Lee and others are concerned that people who don't want to pay a premium for green power must actively opt out if they are enrolled, but public utility officials say the opt-out provision is dictated by state law.
Utility bills for many residential customers are projected to increase by about $9 a month under the program. When commercial customers are factored in, the average monthly bill increase is projected to be $18.
"We are sensitive to the fact that some people cannot afford this," Harrington said. "That is why we will not impose it on them."
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The Board of Supervisors is set to consider legislation Tuesday that would allocate $19.5 million to secure a contract with Shell Energy North America to provide 100 percent renewable power to San Franciscans who want to pay a premium for it, with $2 million of that total allocated to studying local power-generation options.
The program, CleanPowerSF, is designed to build a customer base and revenue stream to lay the groundwork for city-owned renewable power generation while advancing San Francisco's aggressive greenhouse-gas reduction goals. It also would effectively break Pacific Gas and Electric Co.'s decades-old monopoly on the consumer power market in its headquarter city.
"This is about giving consumers a choice," said Supervisor David Campos, who is sponsoring the legislation. "And for the choice to be meaningful, it can't be dependent on one company deciding the energy future of this city."
If CleanPowerSF is approved, San Francisco will become the second municipality in the state to create a community-choice aggregation program after Marin County, which also contracts with Shell to provide renewable power. Such programs were made possible under a 2002 state law that allows municipalities to choose alternative electricity providers.
San Francisco has been trying to work out the details for implementing such a program since 2004, and officials ultimately shelved the idea of creating renewable-power-generating facilities simultaneously with a clean-power purchase agreement.
Curbing carbon emissions
San Francisco Public Utilities Commission General Manager Ed Harrington, who delayed his retirement to finish the proposal, said the program, at a cost of $19.5 million, in its first year would reduce carbon emissions by almost 10 times the amount the city has already been able to cut by spending $93.2 million on solar and other efforts."This is the single biggest program that is even on the horizon within the city and county of San Francisco to make any difference toward any of the goals that you have set as board members in terms of having a change in greenhouse-gas emissions and climate change in San Francisco," Harrington told the Board of Supervisors' budget committee last week. "This program can make a dramatic change."
Under the proposal, roughly half of the city's 375,000 residential power customers would be automatically enrolled in the program to receive renewable power. Those customers would be chosen based on market research the city has already conducted showing support in neighborhoods across the city - from parts of the Richmond to Potrero Hill - for paying extra for power generated through sources like wind and solar, officials said.
Customers automatically enrolled would have five months to opt out of the program at no charge. After that, they could be charged a small fee, about $5, to leave. Other residential and commercial customers could opt in.
Mayor Ed Lee and others are concerned that people who don't want to pay a premium for green power must actively opt out if they are enrolled, but public utility officials say the opt-out provision is dictated by state law.
Utility bills for many residential customers are projected to increase by about $9 a month under the program. When commercial customers are factored in, the average monthly bill increase is projected to be $18.
"We are sensitive to the fact that some people cannot afford this," Harrington said. "That is why we will not impose it on them."
