Reply to Mayor Bowser's Threat to Solar Renewable Energy Credits (SRECs)

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Reply to "Mayor Bowser's Threat to Solar Renewable Energy Credits (SRECs)"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I have to wonder if the mayor fully understood that or if she was bamboozled by lobbyists for the oil and gas industry.

This is completely backwards for DC policy.[/quote]

It doesn't benefit the oil or gas industry either.  This really benefits nobody.

A few years ago DC passed a law mandating that a certain percentage of electricity sold in DC be locally produced and renewable.  Since there is no large scale electricity produced in DC, and will never be to be honest, this mandate can be fulfilled by either buying production credits from small scale local producers (ie: rooftop solar) or by paying a set non-compliance fee.  Because of this dynamic the cost of a local producer credit (SREC) is usually around 10% less than the non-compliance cost.

What Bowser is trying to do is force the electricity distribution companies to pay the non-compliance fee instead of buying producer credits.  Since the producer credits are cheaper this raises electricity costs for everyone.

The purpose of this legislation, which is not unique to DC, is to incentivize electricity distributors to utilize locally generated and/or renewable electricity.  This mandate itself raises local electricity costs.  She is notably not removing the mandate but instead preventing the cheaper form of compliance from functioning.  In effect it's a double whammy.  Extra costs for not having a locally generated product plus extra costs for non-renewable sources while not having any way to utilize local and renewable sources.

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