State PUC chairman not a fan of solar energy

By Robert Dally

Sunday, Dec. 20, 2015 | 2 a.m.

This week, the three-member Public Utilities Commission will determine long-term rates for Nevada’s solar users. I’d wager that PUC Chairman Paul Thomsen already has his mind made up — against solar. Thomsen is the former director of the Governor’s Office of Energy, and when I worked under him as a renewable-energy program manager, I witnessed firsthand his biased behavior against solar energy.

Just after I left the energy office, I delivered a letter to Gov. Brian Sandoval in Carson City explaining Thomsen’s inherent bias against rooftop solar.

Thomsen told me he favors geothermal as a renewable energy. This bias is confirmed in his 2013 article in Transactions, in which he argues that “variable energy resources,” including solar, are not properly priced versus other renewables such as geothermal energy. The year prior, Thomsen said at a media roundtable hosted by the Geothermal Energy Association that California and other Western states were in for a “rude awakening” if they over-procured solar. He told FierceEnergy that same year that geothermal was “the absolute most cost-effective energy resource” available to California but that its regulators and utilities were failing to understand its value.

Thomsen refuses to consider the vast amount of solar energy available in Nevada. He is preoccupied with his loyalty to geothermal energy and cheap electricity as NV Energy uses our atmosphere as a free and infinite sewer.

How could Sandoval knowingly appoint someone as chairman of the PUC with this predetermined outlook on rooftop solar? What will this mean for the climate and the thousands of solar jobs hanging in the balance?

What is clear is that Sandoval will feel political repercussions if Thomsen votes to eliminate the solar industry.

Robert Dally has been involved in the solar photo-voltaic industry for 36 years. He lives in Stateline.