Cal. PUC § 454.57 — California Code / Code puc / Division 1 / Part 1 / Chapter 3 / Article 1 / Section 454.57
Section 454.57
Status: in_force

(a) This section shall be known, and may be cited, as the Accelerating Renewable Energy Delivery Act.

(b) The Legislature finds and declares all of the following:

(1) The commission, the Energy Commission, and the State Air Resources Board have jointly estimated that the state’s installed electric generation may need a threefold increase in capacity to meet state carbon-free electricity policy targets.

(2) Record-setting renewable energy generation build rates are needed to meet the goals of the California Renewables Portfolio Standard Program and the Senate Bill 100 (Chapter 312 of the Statutes of 2018) target of supplying 100 percent of retail sales of electricity from renewable energy resources and zero-carbon resources. However, these build rates are not achievable without additional electrical transmission lines and facilities connecting new resources to consumers in the state’s load centers.

(3) In recent years, California has seen problems in delivering renewable energy resources and zero-carbon resources to customers, including problems caused by constraints on the transmission system. First, there are generation pockets where the total potential output from renewable energy generation exceeds the capacity of the transmission system to export that energy. Second, there are load pockets where there is insufficient transmission capacity to import the renewable energy resources and zero-carbon resources that are available. Both types of constraints should be promptly fixed so that all available renewable energy resources and zero-carbon resources can be delivered to customers.

(4) Reducing the use of nonpreferred resources in disadvantaged communities has been a priority for those communities, and they would benefit from increased access to electricity from new renewable energy resources and zero-carbon resources delivered to serve in-city loads.

(5) New transmission facilities have many steps that must be accomplished before they are online and delivering electricity. Major new transmission lines can take more than a decade from initial planning to operation.

(6) New transmission facilities should be planned proactively to support delivery to load centers from expected locations for future renewable energy resource and zero-carbon resource development, where those locations are identified in the integrated resource planning process pursuant to Sections 454.52 and 9621 or as part of longer range planning processes pursuant to Section 454.53.

(7) New transmission facilities should be designed to minimize the risk of transmission-triggered wildfires.

(8) New transmission facilities should be designed to facilitate renewable energy transmission across California to better manage the variability of electrical supply.

(9) The Independent System Operator has issued a 20-Year Transmission Outlook that identifies substantial additional transmission projects needed to integrate renewable energy resources and storage for retail suppliers within the Independent System Operator balancing authority. Given the scale of this challenge, there is an urgent need to prioritize and accelerate the substantial effort needed to build transmission projects with long development times.

(c) Recognizing that the Independent System Operator’s Federal Energy Regulatory Commission-approved tariff requires the Independent System Operator to plan and approve new transmission facilities needed to achieve the state’s goals, it is the intent of the Legislature that the Independent System Operator shall take notice of the state policies expressed in this section.

(d) In support of the state’s policy to supply increasing amounts of electricity from renewable energy resources and zero-carbon resources pursuant to Article 16 (commencing with Section 399.11) and Section 454.53, beginning as soon as possible and not later than March 31, 2024, the commission, in consultation with the Energy Commission, shall provide transmission-focused guidance to the Independent System Operator about resource portfolios of expected future renewable energy resources and zero-carbon resources. The guidance shall include the allocation of those resources by region based on technical feasibility and commercial interest in each region to allow the Independent System Operator to identify and approve transmission facilities needed to interconnect resources and reliably serve the needs of load centers.

(e) In providing the guidance described in subdivision (d), the commission and the Energy Commission shall provide projections each year, including from the integrated energy policy report prepared pursuant to Section 25302 of the Public Resources Code and the load-serving entities’ integrated resource plans prepared pursuant to Section 454.52, to support planning and approvals by the Independent System Operator in its annual transmission planning process, including by doing all of the following:

(1) Providing projections of resource portfolios and electricity demand by region for at least 15 years into the future to ensure adequate lead time for the Independent System Operator to analyze and approve transmission development, and for the permitting and construction of the approved facilities, to meet the projections.

(2) Providing load growth projections, including projected growth from building and transportation electrification, that are consistent with achieving the economywide greenhouse gas emissions reductions required pursuant to Division 25.5 (commencing with Section 38500) of the Health and Safety Code.

(3) Providing projections of new renewable energy resources and zero-carbon resources consistent with the build rates necessary to achieve the targets established in Article 16 (commencing with Section 399.11) and Section 454.53.

(4) (A) Providing resource projections that, combined with transmission capacity expansions, are expected to substantially reduce, no later than 2035, the need to rely on nonpreferred resources in local capacity areas.

(B) The resource projections in subparagraph (A) shall include consideration of cost-effective and feasible alternatives to transmission capacity expansions, including the use of energy storage resources, renewable energy resources, or zero-carbon resources that are located within the local capacity areas.

(5) Providing projections for offshore wind generation as identified by the SB 100 Joint Agency Report of the commission, the Energy Commission, and the State Air Resources Board, and informed by the strategic plan developed pursuant to Section 25991 of the Public Resources Code, to allow the Independent System Operator to identify and approve transmission facilities needed from offshore wind resource areas that would be sufficient to make offshore wind resources fully deliverable to load centers.

(6) Providing projections for increases in imports of electricity into the state that reflect the expected development of renewable energy resources and zero-carbon resources in other parts of the Western Interconnection for the purpose of delivering clean energy to California balancing authorities.

(f) On or before January 15, 2023, the commission shall request the Independent System Operator to do both of the following:

(1) Identify, based as much as possible on studies completed before January 1, 2023, by the Independent System Operator and projections provided before January 1, 2023, by the commission and the Energy Commission, the highest priority transmission facilities that are needed to allow for increased transmission capacity into local capacity areas to deliver renewable energy resources or zero-carbon resources that are expected to be developed by 2035 into those areas.

(2) Consider whether to approve transmission projects identified pursuant to paragraph (1) as part of its 2022–23 transmission planning process.

(g) It is the policy of the state that new transmission facilities be built on a timely basis and in anticipation of new electrical generation that will be built to meet the state’s renewable energy resource and zero-carbon resource targets, with interim targets for transmission capacity additions that demonstrate adequate progress toward meeting these long-term transmission needs. The commission shall request that the Independent System Operator implement this policy by approving transmission projects needed based on a longer planning period supported by the guidance provided pursuant to subdivisions (d) and (e). The projects should be approved in time to be online when needed, considering permitting and construction lead times.

(h) It is the policy of the state that planning for new transmission facilities considers the following goals:

(1) Minimizing the risk of wildfire.

(2) Increasing systemwide reliability and cost efficiency, including through the sharing of diverse electrical generation resources within California and with other parts of the Western Interconnection.

(3) Eliminating transmission constraints that prevent electrical generation resources from delivering to the wider grid and that prevent importing energy into load pockets.

(i) For purposes of this section, the following definitions apply:

(1) “Local capacity area” means a transmission constrained load pocket, as identified by the Independent System Operator, where local generation capacity is needed for reliability due to insufficient transmission capacity into the load pocket to meet electricity demand with electricity from outside of the load pocket.

(2) “Nonpreferred resources” means electrical generation resources that are not renewable energy resources or zero-carbon resources pursuant to Section 454.53.