Facebook
Fark
Digg
Reddit
Stumble
Friday, March 15, 2013 | 6:10 p.m.
Electric companies would be required to supply more solar, wind and geothermal power to their customers under a bill introduced in the Senate.
“We are not going to consider anything to drive up the cost to the consumer,” says Sen. Kelvin Atkinson, chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Labor and Energy, which sponsored Senate Bill 252 on Friday.
The measure comes on the heels of a complaint by state Public Utilities Commissioner David Noble that the Legislature only passes laws that jack up rates of consumers.
These include requirements that NV Energy must buy a certain amount of renewable energy in supplying its customers. Renewable energy is still more expensive to produce than is energy through coal or natural gas.
“Everybody is maxed out” in paying these electric bills, said Noble, who added the Legislature never considers anything to lower electric bills.
The state Bureau of Consumer Protection said Friday the bill would result in higher rates for consumers.
The current law mandates that the power company must obtain 25 percent of its electricity from renewable sources by 2025. The bill introduced Friday raises that to 35 percent.
U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, in his address to the Legislature, recommended the amount of renewable energy be boosted to 35 percent. Atkinson said he had his bill requested before Reid’s suggestion but added he met with the senator and his staff later on the plan.
Dan Jacobsen, technical staff manager for the consumer protection bureau, said he “hopes the Legislature will focus on the rate impact” of the legislation.
At the request of Noble, the staff of the PUC is compiling a list of the programs approved by the Legislature that have resulted in higher rates to the consumer.
Atkinson said his bill was a starting point and he will try to get opinions from a variety of sources including NV Energy, which serves about 1.5 million Nevada customers.
“Everybody recognizes the portfolio standards are outdated and we need to close some of the loopholes,” he said.
Under the current law, the power companies, if they have acquired excess renewable resources, can transfer them to a later year to meet the standards. Atkinson’s bill would limit that excess power savings to 10 percent.
“We are trying to come up with something that is comprehensive and doesn’t burden the consumer,” he said.
Amazing that converting energy from the sun, water and wind is actually MORE expensive than mining for coal and drilling for natural gas! Correct me if I'm wrong but heavy machinery and people are not needed to maintain these devices that support renewable energy.
NV Energy always wins in this game.
The senator is either lying or a fool. You can't mandate a sneeze without Nevada power planning a rate increase, need it or not. Mandating an increase in wind, solar, etc. with no increase? He knows better and is blowing hot air or he is too foolish to hold elective office.
Why is Solar and Wind so expensive?
Solar and wind require vast arces of land which is expensive.
Solar and wind are not 24/7 reliable producers of energy. So they produce far less units of energy then predictable 24/7 energy producing engines like natural gas and coal. So the fixed cost of solar and wind plants are spread out over lower units of energy than natural gas and coal. That weaker of economies of scale pushes the price up on solar and wind.
Since solar and wind at times will fail to produce needed energy. Power utiilities need to have duplicate reliable systems like coal and natural gas on stand-by. That is insane to have duplicate capital cost and idle operation cost to make libs happy.
Natrual gas and coal are highly efficient producers of energy. Natural gas and coal power plants can produce vastly larger quantities of units of energy than any solar or wind plant could ever dream of producing.
It is much more easier to build a coal or natural gas plant next to an existing power transmission lines.
One has to build these expensive power transmission lines systems to solar and wind power plants that are in remote difficult areas. That is a lot expensive land purchases too.