NEWS, PRESS ADVISORIES, ACTIONS
Susie Ximenez
Tell New York State DON'T RAISE OUR RATES!

Join your neighbors and community organizations, including Citizens for Local Power, Nobody Leaves Mid-Hudson, Sane Energy Project, RUPCO, and Alliance for a Green Economy, at the online hearing on October 28, and tell the Public Service Commission why you object to the rate hikes.

Tell New York State DON'T RAISE OUR RATES!

REV

Governor Cuomo, Stop “Darth VDER” from killing solar in New York!

On August 28, CLP joined the Energy Democracy Alliance and other groups holding press conferences in six cities (NYC, Long Island, Kingston, Syracuse, Elmira, and Buffalo) with an urgent call to Governor Cuomo: Fix New York’s solar policy by restoring net metering – the old policy under which the utility bought any solar energy you contributed to the grid at the price you would have paid if you were buying that same electricity from the utility.

Summer 2018 Newsletter

Finally, summer! The last months have been a tough slog, but we have good news to report on several fronts: a victory in the Central Hudson rate case, movement on Community Choice Aggregation (CCA), and a breakthrough in storage regulation. New threats include a planned “grid support project” that isn’t all it is cracked up to be, and needs to be opposed – indeed is being opposed by a strong coalition of Town of Ulster residents and environmental/energy activists.
 
Read the full newsletter here.

Contents:

  • Central Hudson Rate Case Victory Lowers Fixed Rates
  • Lincoln Park Grid Support Center Project
  • Ulster Green Business Challenge Lifts Off on June 27
  • Storage breakthrough on Federal and State Rules (could be a game-changer)
  • CCA (Working Group report, next steps to influence policy changes)

Storage breakthrough on Federal and State Rules (could be a game-changer)

Earlier this year the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) earned our praise for two decisions. To the surprise of many observers, it firmly declined to implement an order from Energy Secretary Rick Perry to subsidize coal and nuclear generation (supposedly for ‘resilience,” but in reality to help a few large corporations), and it also ordered all states to adopt rules that allow storage to compete fairly with other energy services. 

PSC Issues Order Changing the Way Solar Owners/Customers Are Compensated for Their Power

On March 9, the Public Service Commission (PSC) adopted an Order changing the method utilities will use to compensate solar customers for the power they produce. The new policy will replace net-metering, which has been in place in New York since 1997 and which has contributed enormously to the growth of customer-sited solar projects in the Mid-Hudson region. Under the old rules, customers with solar arrays that feed electricity into the grid receive credit for the electricity they produce at the same rate they would pay the utility. These rules will still apply for existing renewable installations and for new residential and small commercial installations until 2020.  But new community solar projects, remote net-metered projects (such as solar at a municipal landfill), and large customer-sited projects (like a roof-top project at a hospital, university, or large grocery store) will be subject to new rules. For these projects, utilities will use a “Value Stack” tariff, compensating customers based on the benefits and costs of their power to the grid and, to a more limited extent, the environment.