Up for a vote at the Nov. 5 meeting of the California Public Utilities Commission will be a resolution approving Southern California Edison’s (SCE) request for approval of a renewables portfolio standard (RPS) eligible power purchase agreement (PPA) with RE Garland LLC.
The 187-MW RE Garland Project is located in Kern County, California, near the city of Rosamond, and is being developed by Recurrent Energy LLC. The project will interconnect with the California Independent System Operator-controlled grid at Whirlwind Substation. This is a 15-year renewable energy PPA that resulted from SCE’s 2014 RPS solicitation and was executed in July.
The California RPS program was established by Senate Bill (SB) 1078, and has been subsequently modified. The RPS program administered by the commission requires each retail seller to procure eligible renewable energy resources so that the amount of electricity generated from eligible renewable resources is an amount that equals an average of 20% of the total electricity sold to retail customers in California for compliance period 2011-2013; 25% of retail sales by Dec. 31, 2016; and 33% of retail sales by Dec. 31, 2020.
Under the RE Garland PPA, SCE is to begin purchasing generation beginning April 1, 2017. The expected annual generation to be purchased from the project is 555 Gigawatt-hours (GWh). This generation could count towards SCE’s RPS requirements in Compliance Period 2017-2020.
The RE Garland project will use solar photovoltaic panels that have been technically proven on utility-scale generation projects. The RE Garland facility will share existing interconnection facilities with its affiliate, RE Garland A LLC, which has a CAISO Large Generation Interconnection Agreement (LGIA) executed on May 15, 2015.
Two projects were subject to recent filings with FERC
Two project affiliates of Recurrent Energy on Aug. 11 filed with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission notices of self-certification as exempt wholesale generators related to two parts of a total 200-MW solar project in California that are due for operation in 2016 and 2017.
- RE Garland LLC filed with respect to its ownership and operation of a 180-MW phase of a project located in Kern County. It said the facility is due to commence commercial operation by April 1, 2017. It will be interconnected to the transmission system owned by SCE. Commencing April 1, 2017, all of the output from the facility will be sold exclusively at wholesale under a 15-year power purchase agreement with SCE.
- RE Garland A LLC also filed an EWG notice for its 20-MW phase of this project. RE Garland A anticipates that its facility will commence commercial operation by Dec. 1, 2016. Commencing that day, all of the output from the facility will be sold exclusively at wholesale pursuant to a 20-year power purchase agreement with SCE.
