Recently, Arizona Public Service Co. (APS) proposed to the Arizona Corporation Commissioners (ACC) to increase the current monthly fee for solar customers. The fee would have gone from $0.70 per installed kW to $3 per kW. Currently, the average Flagstaff monthly fee is about $3.50. The proposed change would have brought that up to $15/month.
APS requested the fee because they claim solar customers are not paying their fair share for their use of grid power (at night, and during cloudy weather).
The APS proposal was based on a precedent started by Salt River Project (SRP), a Phoenix based utility. Once SRP implemented the higher fee, solar installations decreased dramatically.
The proposed fee stirred up a controversy and some questioning of objectivity of some of theArizona Corporation Commissioners.
Quoted from an AZ Central post (linked below):
The Alliance for Solar Choice (mid Sept. 2015) filed for a rehearing, arguing the increase would be unconstitutional and that the matter only should be heard in the 2016 rate case. That argument was bolstered by a recent Arizona Court of Appeals decision that found some water rate increases approved by the commission are not constitutional because they take place outside a rate case.
“This is a clear signal that they understand what they were asking for was inappropriate,” said Court Rich, an attorney for The Alliance for Solar Choice. “This is a good first step for them toward doing the right thing.”
Since the proposed fee was so contentiously debated, APS withdrew their proposal and is instead pursuing a newly-structured rate they will place on future solar customers.
They have also proposed that regulators perform a study to clarify whether or not costs are actually shifted toward non-solar customers. A rate hearing to take place in the summer of 2016, but a decision is expected to take a full year.
You can read the full story here.
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