Memorandum
Date: April 28, 2020
To: The Honorable Moke SImon, Chair, Lake County Board of Supervisors
From: Carol J. Huchingson, County Administrative Officer
Subject: Consideration of an Update on Community Choice Aggregation (CCA) and Direction to Staff for Future Efforts
Executive Summary: (include fiscal and staffing impact narrative):
Community Choice Aggregation (CCA) enables Counties and/or Cities to pool the electricity demand of participating communities' facilities to purchase and/or develop power on their behalf. Significant entities engaged in CCA services include Marin Clean Energy, Redwood Coast Energy Authority (Humboldt County), Monterey Bay Community Power, and, more locally, Sonoma Clean Power (SCP), which presently serves customers in Mendocino County.
As your Board is aware, Ordinance No. 3026 was unanimously passed on Tuesday, June 23, 2015, authorizing implementation of a Community Choice Aggregation (CCA) Program in Lake County. At the time this Ordinance was passed, CCA was believed to offer energy cost savings to the County of Lake and members of the public, and possibly even an opportunity to increase County General Fund revenues.
On December 15, 2015, the Lake County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to issue an RFP for "Community Choice Aggregation Development and Operations Services," and contracted for specialty legal counsel, in partnership with Mendocino County. SCP was among the entities that responded to Lake County's RFP.
By March 22, 2016, however, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) had authorized increases in PG&E's "Power Charge Indifference Adjustment" (PCIA) fees, to such an extent that some CCA customers were reportedly seeing higher electricity costs than those offered by PG&E. In May of 2016, work toward CCA implementation was indefinitely paused, due to staffing and workload challenges associated with Valley Fire recovery.
In May of 2018, with support from local Energy Consultants Ca...
Click here for full text