by Bruce Goodman

Earlier this month, I had total replacement surgery on my right hip. Nagging pains that started ten years ago gradually developed into stronger, sharper pains, causing me to walk off-kilter. I knew it was time for corrective action and thanks to my skilled surgeon, I now look forward to a future free of pain. Michigan’s alternative energy development efforts are kind of like that: we are off kilter and surgery is needed. Ever since 1978 and PURPA, standby tariffs in Michigan have taken the incentive out of self-generation projects that make economic sense. This “nagging pain” must be corrected by the MPSC before self-generation developers give up on Michigan. Adding to the pain is the refusal of the major utilities to use their purchasing power to attract an established wind turbine OEM to Michigan. Our legislature gave the utilities a gift of half the RPS action; the quid pro quo should have been to use that gift to bring an OEM to Michigan. Whether it is the MPSC, the Governor, or the legislature, someone needs to find the political will to make this happen, before the utility wind turbine orders are placed. Where is our political team of surgeons?

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by Bruce Goodman

For many who have been in the energy practice since the PURPA days it seems like history is repeating itself. The Public Utilities Policy Act of 1978 had as its laudable goal the encouragement of renewable energy and energy efficiency. Small power production (renewable) projects and cogeneration (energy efficiency) projects were intended to make the nation more energy efficient and self sufficient. Just as now, ratepayers saw renewable energy and dispersed power as a way to save money while contributing to energy independence. However, progress was impeded by Michigan utilities who challenged the meaning of “avoided cost” and who imposed stifling standby rates. Today the utilities are again impeding the development of alternative energy and again are using purchase power rates and standby rates as two of their weapons. [Setting standby rates at a level that assumes all independent power on the grid will go down at the same time is not appropriate.  Notwithstanding a good start on the standby issue in the new net metering rules, except for very small projects standby remains a hurtle and an impediment.]  Unless the legislature aggressively addresses competitive pricing and standby rates, it may be déjà vu again in Michigan.

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by Bruce Goodman

This month I rediscovered the interrobang (‽), first introduced in 1962. Intended to be used when a sentence is both a question and an excited exclamation, it never caught on. Writers and editors have been satisfied with ?!?! It strikes me that alternative energy is the epitome of the interrobang—both an exciting prospect, but just as often an open question. Alternative energy was last in vogue in the 1980s, as a response to the mid-east oil embargos. Then it was called small power production. Energy independence was the goal. We got the 55 mph speed limit, expanded daylight savings, and CAFÉ standards. This is when the first wind turbines were installed in the U.S. under PURPA. But the electric utilities did not like this statute, another oil embargo did not occur, and the public concern over gasoline prices subsided. Now the “energy crisis” has been rediscovered, global warming has been added, and we have revived some of the old strategies. Here comes alternative energy‽

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