LANSING – Trying to stay on par with the Michigan House, the Senate on Thursday discharged to the floor five bills to help boost the state’s development and use of alternative energy.

Sen. Patricia Birkholz (R-Saugatuck) said both on the Senate floor and in a press conference on Senate GOP priorities (see related story) that the legislation will actually help build a market for alterative energy without forcing ratepayers to pay for the development of alternative sources.

The bills will do that because they will require state government to use energy created by alternative sources.

Discharged from the Energy Policy and Public Utilities Committee were SB 427 , SB 947 , SB 1000 , SB 1040 and SB 1041 .

On Wednesday the House Energy and Technology Committee reported HB 5525 , HB 5548 and HB 5549 , which would require the state to have 10 percent of its energy produced by alternative means by 2015.

But critics of the House legislation said the bills could force as much as $8 billion in additional costs onto ratepayers for the construction and development of alternative sources.

Birkholz said the Senate proposal avoids that by making the state the customer. So long as the cost of energy generated by alternative means was within 5 percent of the generation costs of energy produced by traditional means, the state would purchase the power.

Under the bills, the state would have to acquire 3 percent of its power through alternative sources by 2010 and 20 percent by 2020, with other percentages required through other years.

Knowing they will have a customer to purchase the energy generated by alternative means will help spur development of alternative generators in the state, Birkholz said.

Utility competitors hailed movement on SB 427, which would require competitive bidding for any expanded generation capacity. “The Senate is looking at competition and not monopolization,” said David Waymire with the Customer Choice Coalition. Under the bill, “renewables could bid, energy efficiency could bid, the utilities could bid. The lowest price would have to guarantee that they would come in with no cost overruns.”

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