The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) unanimously approved today their December 23, 2009 Tradable REC Proposed Decision, but the Commission made some important last minute amendments. 
 

This decision will allow California utilities to use renewable energy credits to comply with the state’s renewable energy requirements for the first time.  Some of the major changes approved during today’s meeting include:

• Decrease in the amount of RECs investor-owned utilities can use toward their compliance obligation from 40% to 25%.
• Re-classification of bundled transactions with out-of-state facilities using firming and shaping as TREC-only transactions (and therefore inclusion under the 25% cap).

Other major elements of the decision include:

• Inclusion of a new a $50 price cap per REC -- contracts exceeding this threshold will not be approved by the CPUC.
• The Commission awarded themselves the power to review and change the decision before the rules sunset on December 31, 2011.

The final CPUC decision can be reviewed here, but we wanted to provide you with some of the major changes that were added at today’s meeting. We will continue to closely watch this issue and provide you with additional updates when they become available.
 

For more information on the California REC market, please contact our Western REC desk in San Francisco at +1 415.963.9120.