LANSING – Sen. Mike Nofs told Gongwer News Service on Monday that he had met with several groups to work out a negotiation on competitive bidding as it relates to energy policy before his Senate Energy and Technology Committee, with hopes the parties can come to an agreement soon and the bills move out of committee within the next two weeks.

“Some think they’re still going to be locked out, that they won’t be able to compete and/or utilities would be able to write the plan that would exclude them,” Nofs (R-Battle Creek) told Gongwer.

The provision in question stems from the ability of companies other than DTE Energy and Consumers Energy to bid on projects to build new generation, which will become increasingly important as the utilities retire older plants as part of a plan to be in compliance with the federal Clean Power Plan on carbon emissions.

The current process which Nofs’ legislation (SB 437) seeks to amend allows utilities planning more than $500 million in an expansion or new build to go through a Certificate of Necessity process to demonstrate a need for building new capacity to the Public Service Commission to get approval. But some close to the energy policy discussions say that process is inherently flawed because it permits only the regulated utilities themselves to demonstrate their need, keeping out outsiders.

One such group is Midland Cogeneration Venture, which runs the nation’s largest natural gas fired and combined electrical energy and steam energy generating plant in Midland – home to the Dow Chemical Company, which is a major employer in that region.

Nofs, speaking to Gongwer, said he maintains that his legislation (tie-barred with SB 438) already provides for a process that would effectively allow others to bid on new generation builds, but those in opposition to the legislation – including MCV – have said they seek clearer language to ensure such.

“Everybody agrees the commission doesn’t have to approve the plan,” he said. “Even though we think it does most of that stuff, they wanted some language that jumps right out.”

The change is one of what could be many to come. Nofs said he is working on an S-3 substitute that will be presented to the committee in due time, and there are still other ongoing negotiations not necessarily linked to just the competitive bidding aspect (though he said it’s one of the last things he’s had to hammer out).

“We’re still working with the governor’s office on a couple of issues. We’ve got to get them on board,” Nofs said.

Governor Rick Snyder has previously said he would expect the state to be getting between 30 and 40 percent of its energy through renewables by 2025. The latest version of the Senate proposal includes a “blended goal” of 30 percent renewable energy and energy efficiency by 2025, but it doesn’t point specifically to renewable energy on its own.

That part has been a major factor to gain Democratic support, Sen. Hoon-Yung Hopgood (D-Taylor), minority vice chair of the Senate Energy Committee, told Gongwer on Monday.

Hopgood said the 30 percent blended goal is “a positive” in the bills, but “we’d just like to expand upon that.”

“We’d love to see a standard with a number that does something like” the 2008 renewable energy mandate (10 percent by 2015), Hopgood said. “We’ve talking with the chairman, in committee, advocating within different public venues. It’s something we’ve been holding out on as a priority.”

Hopgood said renewable energy and keeping energy efficiency goals have been a priority for Democrats. Outside of a specific mandate on renewables, Hopgood said something Democrats could get behind is extending or removing the sunset altogether related to energy efficiency.

The Senate proposal currently renames energy optimization programs to energy waste reduction programs. Energy optimization programs were established in the 2008 law that required gas and electric utilities to implement programs to reduce overall energy usage by certain targets that then relieve load management for the utilities generating, buying and selling that power to consumers.

Indeed, this too has been a priority for Snyder, which Hopgood pointed out.

“This is an area that the governor’s talked a lot about. There seems to be a lot of support behind it, so why not continue to let it go?” Hopgood said. “Maybe have some sort of reporting mechanism in the policy that says you have to have some sort of assessment about how effective the efficiency programs are or if there’s a considerable hurdle.

“It’s something that benefits lots of people in Michigan,” he said.

This story was published by Gongwer News Service. To read more, click on www.gongwer.com