Thanks to the enactment of Assembly Bill 117 in the fall of 2002, cities and counties now have the option of pursuing Community Choice to meet the electrical energy needs of their residents, businesses and municipal facilities.
Community Choice permits any city, county or joint powers authority to aggregate the electrical loads of residents, businesses and municipal facilities for electricity purchases. An opt-out provision allows constituents to elect not to participate in Community Choice and to continue having their current utility provide their electric energy supply.
Community Choice customers will benefit from local involvement in power generation and procurement while the current utility companies will continue to deliver the electricity over its wires and provide traditional utility functions such as meter reading, billing and maintenance services.
To date, 12 municipalities have joined together to form the San Joaquin Valley Power Authority. This regional energy program is the first community choice aggregation program to be certified by the California Public Utilities Commission. The 12 participating municipalities include:
To meet the energy requirements of the residents, businesses and municipal facilities of these 12 entities, KRCD is in the permitting process for construction of the
KRCD Community Power Plant, a 565-megawatt, natural gas-fired power plant in our region. KRCD will own and operate this new generation facility. This plant will be supplemented with long-term and short-term market purchases to satisfy peak demand.
KRCD is committed to developing new renewable energy projects in our valley. Renewable energy sources, such as small hydro, solar, wind, biomass and geothermal, are being explored in order to meet the Renewable Portfolio Standard of 20 percent by 2010. KRCD issued a Request for Proposals for Eligible Renewable Electric Power Supply in April 2007. KRCD is especially interested in renewable projects that are local to the San Joaquin Valley.
For additional information on Community Choice, please visit the project website at www.communitychoice.info.
