Lots going on in the California Public Utilities Commission's renewables docket.  First, nearly 30 parties commented on the Commission's proposed decision regarding the portfolio content categories. See our advisory regarding the categories to learn more about that.

In addition, the Commission just issued its proposed decision (PD) on overall procurement targets for utilities.

Instead, the PD approves its own straw proposal for intervening year targets that increase each year on a straight line. However, a utility need not procure 25% of its procurement in 2016 and 33% of its procurement in 2020—instead it need only procure the cumulative procurement required for the 2014-2016 compliance period and the 2017-2020 compliance period.

The calculations for utilities are:

MWh of RPS-eligible procurement required for 2011-2013= .20 * (retail sales for 2011 + retail sales for 2012 + retail sales for 2013), where retail sales are expressed in megawatt-hours (MWh).

MWh of RPS-eligible procurement required for 2014-2016= (.217 * 2014 retail sales) + (.233 * 2015 retail sales) + (.25 * 2016 retail sales), where retail sales are expressed in MWh.

MWh of RPS-eligible procurement required for 2017-2020= (.27 * 2017 retail sales) + (.29 * 2018 retail sales) + (.31 * 2019 retail sales) + (.33 * 2020 retail sales), where retail sales are expressed in MWh.

Comments are due on the proposed decision on November 17th.  Reply comments are due November 22nd.