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The MEPUC initiated this rulemaking proceeding to update its Net Energy Billing (NEB) rule, Chapter 313, to reflect recently enacted legislation. The MEPUC’s proposal, includes among other things the following:

• adds definitions for “benefits of distributed generation under net energy billing,” “net energy billing,” and “net energy billing costs”;
• amends the definition for “eligible facility” to clarify the various components of eligibility to participate in NEB, including the exceptions that apply for an NEB facility serving a customer that is a municipality, or a customer that is located in a co-op’s territory;
• changes the current practice of applying the value of expired net energy billing credits to the accounts of AMP customers and instead requires that the value of those credits be used for the benefit of individuals participating in the Low-Income Assistance Program.
• requires expired credits from the kWh program to be monetized by the utilities and remitted to the MEPUC, which will forward these funds to the Maine State Housing Authority to be disbursed as part of the Low-Income Assistance Program (LIAP);
• provides for joint responsibility between the utility and the project sponsors for identifying and correcting errors within the time period required by ISO-NE tariff or market rules; and
• implements new requirements for the MEPUC to determine the costs and benefits of net energy billing annually. To determine the costs of NEB, the MEPUC proposes using the approach it currently uses, which is to obtain the information from the utilities through the annual stranded cost proceedings.

Initial Comments:
The Wishcamper Companies (TWC) filed initial comments (2/20/24) advocating “for a more rigorous process for analyzing the NEB cost under the Chapter 313 rule to ensure that the annual cost/benefit reporting is as accurate as possible,” appealing to a study by the Daymark energy consulting firm it commissioned “to review the NEB Cost in the stranded cost filings.” Of note, TWC said that Daymark “corrected formula errors in Maine utilities’ stranded spreadsheets, updated electricity market assumptions, and adjusted MW installed, and capacity factor based upon additional research,” resulting in a reduction in “NEB program costs from $185 million to $122 million in 2025.”

Final comments on proposed changes (2/20–2/23/24). 

1. OPA provided a response to the TWC-sponsored Daymark study in addition to comments in which it said that “TWC misconstrues the purpose of the reports filed by T&D utilities under Chapter 313 and the role that these reports play in setting stranded cost rates,” arguing that they “are informational only and do not form the basis of establishing stranded costs,” being “subject to discovery, with intervenors then having the opportunity to provide comments or testimony challenging any of the utility’s assumptions”; 
2. OPA argued that, given the danger that “if advocates continue to repeat false claims, many citizens will begin to believe those claims,” “It is not enough for the Commission to simply dismiss the comments of TWC as irrelevant or beyond the scope of this rulemaking proceeding,” but rather “it is incumbent on the Commission to explain that this criticism is misplaced and the current stranded cost rates accurately reflect the cost of the NEB program and, accordingly, ratepayers can be assured that the resulting rates are just and reasonable”; 
3. OPA defended proposed language that would make NEB developers “jointly responsible for identifying metering errors related to their generation,” arguing that it “is similar to language in other standard form contracts adopted by the Commission and would clarify that that T&D utilities and NEB projects sponsors are each responsible for reviewing meter data to ensure accurate billing and payment,” a sentiment echoed by Coalition for Community Solar Access and Maine Renewable Energy Association (CCSA-MREA); 
4. Natural Resources Council of Maine and CCSA-MREA argued that “environmental benefits must be included in the annual determination of the benefits of distributed generation” using “the federal standard for the social cost of greenhouse gasses,” noting that RECs are an accounting mechanism that should not be mistaken for “a method to value the environmental benefits of renewable generation”; 
5. CCSA-MREA recommended “using one year forecasts to assess revenue requirements for the Net Energy Billing (NEB) program, and discontinuing the 3 year forecasts” as these, “have no bearing on the actual cost recovery of the NEB program, and yet have had a sizeable impact on the public discourse”; 
6. CCSA-MREA argued that “When producing these single year forecasts, the utilities should use standardized assumptions and inputs that have consensus from intervening parties,” including: (i) “capacity factors, which should be derived from actual production from similarly sized and situated distributed solar projects in Maine”; (ii) “standard offer prices”; (iii) “wholesale market prices”; and (iv) “the timing and amount of new capacity of NEB projects expected to come online”; 
7. ReVision reiterated that it does not believe “the stranded cost proceedings as currently conducted, and stranded cost rate design as currently defined, are the right forum or process,” arguing, among other things, that: (i) MEPUC’s “most recent stranded cost rate determinations are currently under appeal and certain of the Commission’s most recent Orders regarding the determination of stranded costs related to the tariff and kWh NEB programs are now rendered moot by LD 1986”; (ii) “the stranded cost ratemaking proceedings, as well as the stranded costs reconciliation proceedings in dockets 2022-341 for CMP and 2022-356 for Versant, to date have failed to calculate NEB program benefits, nor do they go through the process of offsetting documented NEB costs by monetized NEB benefits”; and (iii) “he stranded cost reconciliation proceedings appear so far to be based on projected NEB costs rather than verifiable costs that have actually been incurred by T&D utilities as required by statute”; and 
8. TWC urged adoption of the Crossborder Energy study “Best Practices for Assessing the Benefits of Distributed Generation in Maine” that it submitted jointly with Dirigo Solar and ReVIsion.

Transcript of 2/8/24 hearing made available (2/13/24).

2023-00284  (10/25/2023)