Las Vegas Sun

March 18, 2024

NV Energy seeks solar grandfathering in advance of court hearing

NV Energy Solar Protest Rally

John Locher / AP

Michelle Balistreri and Chandler Gray attend a rally in front of NV Energy on Wednesday, April 22, 2015, in Las Vegas. Hundreds of activists gathered outside NV Energy headquarters in Las Vegas to protest a state cap affecting rooftop solar installations and urge the Legislature to lift it.

NV Energy urged the Public Utilities Commission of Nevada on Wednesday to let about 32,000 rooftop solar customers keep prior, more favorable rates for electricity. Such a move would apply to residential NV Energy customers who installed rooftop solar or qualified for solar arrays prior to Dec. 31.

If the commission approves NV Energy’s request, those customers will be shielded by a regulatory decision in December to impose new rates that are likely to increase bills for solar customers.

Those rates, implemented over 12 years, triple a fixed fee and slash the value of credits customers can earn for sending excess electricity back to NV Energy. Despite opposition from NV Energy and rooftop solar firms, the commission decided not to grandfather existing customers and apply the new rates to all solar customers. NV Energy on Wednesday asked it to only apply the new rates to future customers.

The filing would allow the customers to keep the prior rates for 20 years. It also urges the utilities commission, which has been reluctant to allow grandfathering in the past, to act with 90 days. NV Energy urged utility regulators to “approve the (filing) in order to end the current controversy and eliminate the uncertainty that surrounds so many of NV Energy’s private solar customers today.”

Paul Caudill, NV Energy’s chief executive, said he cannot predict the request’s outcome but that it was an important move to protect existing rooftop solar customers, who are also NV Energy customers.

“The proposal is simple and fair,” Caudill said in a news release.

The utility’s filing with its regulator Wednesday comes during a high-pitched debate between NV Energy and rooftop solar firms over how the technology should be integrated with the grid.

NV Energy has argued that under the prior rates, solar users avoided paying their share of the utility’s fixed costs, shifting the burden of those costs to other customers. Solar companies argue that the benefits of rooftop solar outweigh the costs for all utility ratepayers. NV Energy and solar companies have been arguing publicly and privately for several months about how this should play out in policy.

SolarCity has spent at least $2 million on a ballot measure that would effectively undo the commission’s new rates for future customers. NV Energy and organized labor have spent about $1 million fighting it. The two sides will meet Friday afternoon as the Nevada Supreme Court hears arguments about whether the SolarCity-backed measure meets the requirements to appear the November ballot. A utility-backed political action committee launched a new TV ad on Tuesday.

NV Energy and the rooftop solar industry have also had discussions behind closed doors. Caudill said NV Energy is working with one solar company to review its study of how to value rooftop solar.

Some of the discussions have been less cordial.

“(NV Energy has) made multiple attempts to work with out-of-state private solar developers, including SolarCity and Sunrun, to identify balanced solutions that would work for all customers in Nevada,” NV Energy wrote in its filing with the commission. “It appears solar developers are more concerned with increasing subsidies needed to run their businesses than taking care of customers.”

Join the Discussion:

Check this out for a full explanation of our conversion to the LiveFyre commenting system and instructions on how to sign up for an account.

Full comments policy