5.2. ERMUSR 09-08-2015 - Laserfiche WebLink

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State Implementation Plan Review. The Department of Commerce and the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency shall jointly submit the state's 111(d)implementation plan to the legislative energy committees for review and comment by March 15, 2016. Natural Gas Extension Projects. Investor-owned gas utilities may petition the Public Utilities Commission for a rate rider to recover the revenue deficiency from a natural gas extension project. Revenue deficiency is defined as the difference between project costs and projected revenues expected from the customers receiving the natural gas as a result of the project. The PUC shall approve a rider if it determines that a project is designed to extend natural gas service to an unserved or inadequately served area and the costs are reasonable and prudently incurred. The PUC must not approve a rider that allows a utility to recover more than 33 percent of the costs of a natural gas extension project. By January 15, 2017 and every three years thereafter, the PUC must report to the Legislature the number of utilities and projects proposed and approved under this section, the total cost of each project, the rate impacts of cost recovery, and an assessment of the effectiveness of the cost recovery mechanism in realizing increased natural gas service. (HF 1522-0'Neill/SF1263-Skoe) Net Metering Reform. The statutes governing the purchasing of net energy from qualifying facilities under 40 kW by municipal utilities and co-ops (Minnesota Statutes 2014, section 216B.164, subdivision 3) are modified. Cooperative electric associations and municipal utilities may charge an additional fee to recover the fixed costs not already paid for by the customer through the customer's existing billing arrangement. Any additional charge by the utility must be reasonable and appropriate for that class of customer based on the most recent cost of service study. The cost of service study must be made available for review by a customer of the utility by request. A customer with a qualifying facility or net metered facility with a capacity under 40 kW that is interconnected to a cooperative electric association or municipal utility may elect to be compensated for the customer's net input into the utility system in the form of a kilowatt-hour credit on the customer's energy bill carried forward and applied to subsequent energy bills. Any kilowatt-hour credits carried forward by the customer cancel at the end of the calendar year with no additional compensation. (Similar provision included in HF 655-Fabian/SF 808-Koenen) EITE. Investor-owned utilities with 50,000-200,000 retail customers (Minnesota Power and Otter Tail Power) are granted the ability to propose energy-intensive, trade-exposed(EITE) customers with`BITE rate"options,which could include fixed-rate, market-based, and rates to encourage clean energy technology. EITE customers include: • Iron mining extracting and processing facilities • Paper mills, wood product manufacturers, or sawmills • Steel mills • Retail customers whose peak demand is at least 10,000 kW,whose combined annual load factor is over 80%, and whose electric costs are at least 10%of overall production costs 122