By Khalida Sarwari
Pacific Gas and Electric Co. announced a proposal today for a five-year program to develop up to 500 megawatts of clean solar photovoltaic power in its Northern and Central California service areas designed to accelerate the growth of renewable energy available to customers, a PG&E spokesman said today.
The proposal, one of the largest programs of its kind in the country, will be submitted for approval to the California Public Utilities Commission, spokesman Jonathan Marshall said. A decision could take up to 18 months but the company is hopeful to get approval as early as this year.
“This project represents a major proposed investment in clean, solar photovoltaic power,” Marshall said. “In addition to which we are soliciting bids from independent power developers to contribute to the same kind of renewable energy in our service area.”
The proposed program aims to develop up to 250 megawatts of utility-owned photovoltaic generation and an additional 250 megawatts to be built and owned by independent developers under a streamlined regulatory process.
If the proposal is approved and programs are in effect by 2015, they are expected to deliver more than 1,000 gigawatt hours of power each year and would meet 1.3 percent of the company’s electric demand.
“We think this (proposal) reflects the commission’s interest in seeing more renewable energy in California,” Marshall said.
The program would benefit state policy makers as well as customers who have expressed a need for a more sustainable energy mix, Marshall said.
“It responds directly to the strong interest of our customers and our state policy makers in growing renewable energy,” Marshall said.
The program would also help revitalize the economy, Marshall said, by being a source of jobs.
Marshall said the program is critical in “fighting global warming and in improving our energy security by developing local energy resources.”