U.S. group wants renewables to replace deregulation

WASHINGTON, DC, 2004-08-11 (Refocus Weekly)

All levels of government in the United States should adopt policies that maximize cost-effective distributed generation and encourage the development of renewable sources of energy, recommends the National Association of State Public Interest Research Groups (USPIRG).

One year after the blackout along the eastern part of North America, the U.S. electric system is becoming “increasingly less reliable,” concludes the report, ‘Toward A Consumer-Oriented Electric System: Assuring Affordability, Reliability, Accountability & Balance After a Decade of Restructuring.’ It urges policy-makers to restrict deregulation of the power sector and to impose “mandatory reliability standards for electric grid operators and increased energy efficiency, partly through the development of renewable energy sources.”

“Decision-making in the electric industry often fails to take into account the costs imposed on society by electricity generation, including impacts on the environment, public health and other sectors of the economy,” it explains. “As a result, resource options that might provide the greatest aggregate benefits to society, such as the expanded use of renewable fuels and improved energy efficiency, are routinely ignored.”

A policy that emphasizes the development of renewables would save $36 billion a year by 2025 compared with a business-as-usual scenario that relies on fossil fuel-fired generation capacity and transmission lines, and would reduce GHG emissions from electricity generation to below 1990 levels by 2025, or 45% below what emissions would be under a business-as-usual scenario.

Reliance on renewables and energy efficiency would also lead to additional savings in other areas, such as reduced expenditures for environmental compliance, reduced public health costs due to air pollution, and reduced price volatility and pressure on fossil fuel supplies. It admits that some of the recommended policies to support renewables “may result in higher short-term costs, but the long-term benefits dwarf those costs.”

“Improved energy efficiency and increased use of renewable resources are in the long-term national interest and often have short-term benefits for consumers,” says co-author Rob Sargent. “Government policy should actively promote the development and use of these resources.”

“Market and regulatory barriers that deter the use of energy efficiency, renewable energy or distributed generation technologies should be removed,” he adds, and the long-term benefits of renewables “must be considered in system planning, rate-making and other regulatory decisions.”

“Government and the electric industry must remove barriers to energy efficiency, renewable power and clean distributed generation in order to reduce strain on the grid and to hedge against fuel price volatility,” the report concludes.

USPIRG is a national network of state-based public interest advocacy groups.


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