SOCAL ED CLAIMS NEW ENERGY #1

SoCal Ed says it has 110 renewables contracts
Christina Lee/Jeffrey Riser, 14 January 2011 (Platts Energy Week)

"Claiming to be the single largest buyer of renewable energy in the US, Southern California Edison has amassed 110 active contracts under which it is or has been purchasing renewable energy since 2005, covering an estimated 8,000 MW of generation…[In 2010] SoCal Ed saw its retail renewables reach just more than 19% of its total retail power distributed…That compares with…[2009’s] 17%…[O]ver the past year the company has been seeing the price of renewable power it is buying, particularly from solar, decrease.

"SoCal Ed was in compliance last year with California's 20% by 2010 renewables portfolio standard, or RPS program…[due] "flexible compliance" rules [that] allow for banking of renewable credits and earmarking for future years deliveries of power that are in excess of goals from prior years. To be counted under the flexible compliance rules, some of the contracted power does not need to actually be delivered until the end of 2013."

SCE was #2 in solar nationally (click to enlarge)

"…San Diego Gas & Electric said…that by the middle of 2010 [New Eneregy] had reached a level of 14% of its total retail power delivered…Pacific Gas and Electric had actual deliveries of renewable power totaling 14.5% of the company's total in 2009…[but PG&E] expects the [final 2010] percentage to be close to 20%, particularly given the flexible compliance rules…SoCal Ed is [now] focusing on signing additional contracts, mainly in the latter part of this decade, as it moves toward compliance with the recently passed 33% by 2020 California Air Resources Board, or CARB, renewables program…

"…[A]t approximately 57%, power drawn from geothermal facilities in Northern and Southern California owned by Calpine, Ormat Technologies and Cal Energy makes up the largest percentage of SoCal Ed's renewable portfolio…The single largest contract for renewable power that SoCal Ed has…is with Terra-Gen Power…Terra-Gen is building the 1,550-MW Alta Wind project north of Los Angeles near the town of Mojave…GE Energy Financial Services and Bankers Commercial have bought the first phase, the 150-MW Alta Wind I farm, and will be leasing it back to Terra-Gen to manage and operate."

SCE was #3 in wind nationally (click to enlarge)

"…[S]olar is becoming "more competitive" and, in some cases, "a better value" than power from wind farms…[led by] projects built by… vertically integrated solar companies that also manufacture their own panels. Two such companies are First Solar and SunPower…

"…[W]hat is driving SoCal Ed is not only the growth of the percentage of retail renewables that the state is demanding, but also load growth, and the fact that contracts with a number of geothermal, wind and solar facilities first drawn up nearly 20 years ago are now rolling off."