Official Southern California Edison thread

"SCE says investors need bigger profits because of fire risks"

https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-sce-edison-pge-bankruptcy-fire-20190421-story.html

"Southern California Edison says it needs higher profits to keep attracting investment following a series of deadly fires sparked by utility-owned electrical equipment that have sent utility stock prices tumbling. Edison doesn’t face as much financial risk as its Northern California counterpart, PG&E. But Pedro Pizarro, president of Edison’s parent company, recently said his utility could be one big fire away from bankruptcy."

Also

"Edison CEO talks wildfires, climate change and the utility’s vanishing monopoly"

https://www.latimes.com/business/la...-wildfires-climate-change-20190313-story.html

I'm guessing my delivery charges will be increasing.

Fascinating articles. Thanks.

I didn’t realize that the utilities were specifically constrained on the percentage of gain they are allowed to offer to investors.

One of my first thoughts is that Edison and the other two huge POUs are already going to see a large increase in revenue from the coming forced shift of customer rates into the new TOU plans with Peak rates in the evenings. At least the customers who have solar roofs are going to see a major increase in annual utility cost when those plans take effect. I’m probably seeing this particular aspect through the lens of a customer with a solar roof, though.

But I assume that Edison has already taken those increased revenues into account when they did their math and came up with a request for further rate increases to cover perceived investor risk.

As the first article that you linked to states, though, Edison’s pending request is largely designed to pressure the state into shielding the utilities from financial responsibility for damage from fires until the utilities can upgrade their infrastructure to be less prone to spark fires.

What can we customers do to shield ourselves from being fleeced in order to protect a utility that operates equipment that isn’t yet adequate to provide protection from accidentally sparking fires in extreme weather situations? Probably add more solar and home battery storage. But those solutions also carry a high capital cost to our household budgets.

I see two potential results. Higher delivery charges could improve the ROI of solar and storage. And if the grid is less dependable because it is preemptively partially disabled during events (wind, earthquake, etc) that might produce a spark, off-grid backup may be more useful or even essential in effected areas.

There is a major upgrade of overhead wiring going on in our area. There is a fleet of hundreds of utility trucks updating the overhead wiring, insulation, and disconnects. Originally I thought grid stability, risk mitigation, or both had stimulated the update, but the scope is impressive.

https://www.vcstar.com/story/news/2...nard-power-plants-ready-early-exit/454991002/

"The latest approval follows a green light by a division of the California Public Utilities Commission on the transmission line solution. The lines, coupled with a green energy project, is expected to meet the power needs in Ventura County. Electricity needs near Goleta could still be met by a small power plant and Edison will accept bids for gas-fired projects in Santa Barbara County.

Earlier this month Edison began accepting bids for a battery storage or solar project to meet the power needs not met by the transmission lines. The deadline for those bids closes in June. "

Investors do not need a bigger return to accept risk. They can sell the stock if too risky.

I can see passing through the costs of maintaining the facilities to avoid fires. What the utilities need is not so much an exemption from liability but an exemption from additional environmental restrictions to clearing the fire risk.

My grandfathered TOU-D-A rate is set to expire end of this month. I ran some quick calcs using my usage data for the last 12 months and I'm looking at about $1k energy cost bump for the year on the new rates. One less incentive to drive an EV. Oh well...

Valdemar said:

My grandfathered TOU-D-A rate is set to expire end of this month. I ran some quick calcs using my usage data for the last 12 months and I'm looking at about $1k energy cost bump for the year on the new rates. One less incentive to drive an EV. Oh well...

Click to expand...

What rate plan are you going to? How do you verify rate expiration?

I am also on TOU-D-A-SDP

I looked ahead to this juncture and decided to add more solar panels to combat this change. I wasn’t quick enough to get the new array installed before the end of 2019, so I’ll have to be happy with the current 26% federal credit instead of the 30% I would have gotten last year, but as you say, Oh Well.

I also penciled out adding batteries, but the solar project had a much better return.

Unfortunately, adding more solar will bump me from NEM 1.0 to NEM 2.0, which carries with it some “Non-Bypassable Charges” of about 2.5 cents per kWh for every kWh SCE sends me, regardless of whether I sent it to them first.

So I’m planning to switch to TOU-D-Prime and charge my cars during the day “behind the meter” to avoid as many NBCs as possible. This is workable because Prime’s daytime rates are the same as the nighttime rates, and there are no lucrative high Peak daytime solar rates that I’ll be forgoing by using power during solar Peak.

With this plan, I should be able to keep my annual costs down to something like $350, but of course I had to pay a net nine or ten grand for the extra solar. There’s no free lunch,

After I decided to add the additional solar, I got recruited into a program through SCE to add a Tesla Powerwall battery as part of a trial project to determine whether community distributed batteries can help mitigate power needs during shortages instead of building another natural gas peaker plant. That battery should allow me to shave off some of the Peak usage costs during Prime’s Peak evening hours and save me a bit more each year. But again, I have to pay for part of the battery after rebates and tax credits. This program is only available in parts of central Orange County, I think. I’m in Irvine. The whole battery project is moving slowly due to inability to get permits during the virus thing.

Moved into a new place recently, and switched to TOU-D-Prime thinking I would come out ahead of domestic tiered rates with two EVs. My spark has been charged ONCE since we moved in. :? At least I've got the two EVSEs installed with a new 125A main. Original service was only 60A!

Hope to get solar installed sometime this year. Wife says A/C first.

Smart man, Jeremy.

Happy wife, happy life.

From SCE:

We currently plan to close these grandfathered rate plans and move customers to the lowest-cost TOU rate plan available in late 2020. Some customers with grandfathered solar generating facilities may be allowed to stay on longer, depending on the date their solar system was activated.

https://www.sce.com/residential/rates/sce-grandfathered-rate-plans

Amazing how the increase in utility solar has changed these TOU plans.
Just the early evening (4pm to 9pm) is at high cost. Those overnight rates are now most of the day.

Not going to get as much for solar production. On the plus side I don't have to super chill my house overnight to coast through the high daytime rates. Just need to coast 4 to 9 then let it rip and get to sleep by 10 pm. Five hour battery looks very encouraging.

smkettner said:

What rate plan are you going to? How do you verify rate expiration?

I am also on TOU-D-A-SDP

Click to expand...

As the new TOU rates are clearly anti-solar it makes sense to just switch to the domestic tiered plan. I'm well within my baseline allocation for all but 2 months a year, it will be cheaper than any of the TOU plans they offer. I have a now abandoned EV meter, I plan to find out if they will let me run it on TOU-Prime just for EV usage without solar but unless we get a second EV it looks ilke just staying on one domestic rate on one meter is the most sensible option.

As for the rate expiration, it's 5 years from the date of getting the permission to operate but no later than some fixed date which is escaping me at the moment, something like July 2021 or maybe 2022?

Boomer23 said:

I looked ahead to this juncture and decided to add more solar panels to combat this change. I wasn’t quick enough to get the new array installed before the end of 2019, so I’ll have to be happy with the current 26% federal credit instead of the 30% I would have gotten last year, but as you say, Oh Well.

I also penciled out adding batteries, but the solar project had a much better return.

Unfortunately, adding more solar will bump me from NEM 1.0 to NEM 2.0, which carries with it some “Non-Bypassable Charges” of about 2.5 cents per kWh for every kWh SCE sends me, regardless of whether I sent it to them first.

So I’m planning to switch to TOU-D-Prime and charge my cars during the day “behind the meter” to avoid as many NBCs as possible. This is workable because Prime’s daytime rates are the same as the nighttime rates, and there are no lucrative high Peak daytime solar rates that I’ll be forgoing by using power during solar Peak.

With this plan, I should be able to keep my annual costs down to something like $350, but of course I had to pay a net nine or ten grand for the extra solar. There’s no free lunch,

...

Click to expand...

In my case, staying on TOU will cost to the tune of $1k annually vs. basically $0 now, a bit less maybe with the baseline and climate credits. Counter-intuitively the TOD-D-PRIME appears to be the worst amongst others due to its high on-peak/off-peak ratio with limited solar output 4-9pm, lack of baseline credit and a daily charge. My annual net grid usage is around 3,000kwh and it will be mainly in tier 1, so I'm looking at $600-700 annually at the domestic rate which I think is a reasonable pill to swallow. I could offset it by adding 2kw to my system which would probably cost somewhere around 3-4k but I'd risk being forced on NEM2.0 so not worth the risk IMO given the 5-6 year payback. You can safely add up to 10% to the original system power rating under the NEM1.0 terms, so I could add 1kW but I don't think I will bother as it is not going to make much of a difference in the large scheme of things. Instead I'm going to look into minimizing usage in other areas, maybe it is the time I should consider a variable speed pool pump or additional attic insulation.

I've been thinking about posting to this thread for a couple of days, after seeing it resurrected the last time.

My solar is still chugging along, 9.5 years later. Had expected the need to replace something would have occurred by now, most likely the inverter, but (touch wood) everything is still as it was installed in November 2010.

Even the production numbers are not off as much as I would told they might be. Or at least they are not off so much that I notice it.

Annual net bill comes in at $205 in energy costs for consuming net 6,449 kWh from the SCE grid. About 3.2 cents per kWh.
Not sure how any of the coming TOU rate changes might affect the cost. Going to ride this one more year if I can.

I think I am in a similar situation. I am in TOU-A and I can see it costing a huge amount if they switch me. My solar will be almost useless from 4 to 9pm. I had noticed I was on a grandfathered plan but I did not know they were kicking us off!

Power wall sounds great to use from 4 to 9 but they are still too expensive.

I also thought about west facing additional solar but I i had not heard it would change my Net Meetering contract.

Bummer.

I'm 5y + 1mo after the PTO was issued and they still haven't switched me over. I read somewhere they may let us run until the end of 2020 on those plans, longer for those who got PTO just before the switchover was decided. Those who leased might end up upside down with their contracts. For those who bought the rate change will reduce the ROI but solar should still provide benefit. NEM1 customers have an option to switch to the tiered domestic plan which should be a better/fairer option than the new TOU. I suspect many do not realize this change is coming.

SCE has a rate comparison tool but does it let me see what NEM 2.0 would cost?

Being the tax deduction is sunsetting fast, if I want more solar, this year seems like the time to do it. How much more does NEM 2 actually cost?

I switched to TOU-a because at that time it was much cheaper than tiered. But maybe NEM 2 with a second solar system and switching back to tiered is the best option.

I can I install a 4 to 5 KW system for around 4 to 6k if I do it myself, which was the plan.

Powerwall is much more expensive. So i do not see better options?

danrjones said:

SCE has a rate comparison tool but does it let me see what NEM 2.0 would cost?

Being the tax deduction is sunsetting fast, if I want more solar, this year seems like the time to do it. How much more does NEM 2 actually cost?

I switched to TOU-a because at that time it was much cheaper than tiered. But maybe NEM 2 with a second solar system and switching back to tiered is the best option.

I can I install a 4 to 5 KW system for around 4 to 6k if I do it myself, which was the plan.

Powerwall is much more expensive. So i do not see better options?

Click to expand...

You can't be on the tiered plan under NEM-2, it's TOU only. Another difference is the non-bypassable charges (NBCs) for grid usage, which means you pay 2-3c for every kWh you take from the grid e.g. nighttime EV charging, unlike NEM-1 these cannot be offset by credits.

Given a single meter SCE will likely force you on NEM-2 for the whole system if you add in excess of the 10% allowed by your NEM agreement but you should talk to them to make sure, who knows maybe they will let you stay on NEM-1.

The comparison tools SCE provides are primitive. If you want to understand the economics of different rates/NEM-1/2 you need to download your annual usage hourly details and model the cost using new TOU rates and NEM-2 NBCs, you can do it with Excel. Very roughly NEM-2 and new TOU rates is about 20% worse than NEM-1/TOU-D-A, in other words if you annual bill was $4,000 before solar and your system is sized well with no overproduction and you end up with $0 or close credit balance at the end of each NEM-1 period, expect the annual bill to be $800-$1000 on NEM2/new TOU.

I don't think there is a good option. Under new rates you basically have to oversize the system to fully offset your bill. SCE used to have a rule that didn't allow that, perhaps it changed. Staying on NEM-1 with your current system and switching to tiered is likely the most sensible thing you can do, maybe add 10% power to it if you can do it yourself to keep the costs low and be within the allowed increase per your NEM agreement. Bad days for solar are here.

Thank you

My initial system was only 3.15 KW DC so 10% more would be 315 watts. That wont help much.

If only the power wall was about 1/3 the cost. If you add one do you stay on NEM 1? It's not adding solar, so my thought was yes.

I guess my option is to over size. It's the cheapest option if I do the work myself. But I'll have to look at the numbers.

Actually there is one more option. Do the work and do not tell SCE. Think they would notice me suddenly sending a bunch more power to the grid? The city might get grumpy though with no permit.

Adding a Powerwall may call for a new inverter. No idea how adding a Powerwall affects your NEM agreement.

I did think about adding bootleg capacity in excess of 10%. It might go unnoticed, or not. Analyzing meter reported data to detect increase in production is not difficult. Hard to say how strict SCE is going to be if they find out, but chances are they will at least switch you over to NEM2.

Doing it without permits, I don't think City will find out, unless there's a fire directly related to solar, which is not unheard of, then you're going to have an interesting conversing with the City and your insurance.

For myself I think it's not worth the risk, but everyone has different sensitivity to risk, it may be perfectly acceptable from your perspective.