Cal. PUC § 454.59 — California Code / Code puc / Division 1 / Part 1 / Chapter 3 / Article 1 / Section 454.59
Section 454.59
Status: in_force

(a) This section applies to the obligations on a state agency, except the State Water Resources Development System commonly known as the State Water Project, imposed pursuant to subdivision (a) of Section 454.53.

(b) Each state agency shall ensure that zero-carbon resources and eligible renewable energy resources supply 100 percent of electricity procured on its behalf by December 31, 2035.

(c) A state agency may satisfy the requirement in subdivision (b) by doing one or more of the following:

(1) Installing zero-carbon resources or eligible renewable energy resources behind the customer meter on state-owned or state-leased buildings to serve the state agency’s onsite load.

(2) Procuring zero-carbon resources or eligible renewable energy resources through the local publicly owned electric utility or load-serving entity, as defined in Section 380, providing retail service to the state agency, subject to any credit or collateral requirements or other applicable requirements imposed by the local publicly owned electric utility or load-serving entity, as defined in Section 380, as a condition for procurement on behalf of a customer.

(3) Participating in a voluntary shared renewable or green pricing program offered by a local publicly owned electric utility or load-serving entity, as defined in Section 380, if the resources serving the state agency satisfy the requirements of subdivision (d).

(d) New procurement commitments made on behalf of a state agency by its retail seller or local publicly owned electric utility after June 1, 2022, for zero-carbon resources or eligible renewable energy resources to serve the state agency pursuant to subdivision (c) shall satisfy all of the following criteria:

(1) The zero-carbon resource or eligible renewable energy resource shall be newly developed as a result of contracting and reach initial commercial operations on or after January 1, 2023.

(2) An eligible renewable energy resource or storage product shall be required to satisfy either of the criteria specified in paragraph (1) of subdivision (b) of Section 399.16.

(3) The zero-carbon resource or eligible renewable energy resource shall be located within California.

(4) The retail seller or local publicly owned electric utility shall require its contractors to use a multicraft project labor agreement, as defined in paragraph (1) of subdivision (b) of Section 2500 of the Public Contract Code, for construction of the zero-carbon resource or eligible renewable energy resource. The project labor agreement shall conform to the industry standard agreements recently used for other similar private projects, including side letters for high-voltage transmission and related work.

(5) The retail seller or local publicly owned electric utility shall exclude the retail sales to a state agency customer from any compliance obligations relating to zero-carbon resources or eligible renewable resources, including, but not limited to, obligations pursuant to Section 399.25 or 399.30.

(6) Any renewable energy credits or environmental attributes associated with incremental procurement pursuant to this section shall be retired on behalf of the state agency customer and shall not be further sold, transferred, or otherwise monetized for any purpose.

(e) Zero-carbon resource or eligible renewable energy resource procurement commitments made on behalf of a state agency shall give preference to resource options expected to yield maximum long-term employment, stimulate new economic activity, generate local and state tax revenues, and assist with the development of new industries.