Maine advances legislation restoring net metering

The Maine state legislature has voted to advance a bill that would amend the state's statute governing the net metering of small distributed renewable energy projects. If enacted into law, the amendment would reverse regulatory changes imposed in 2017 that reduced the value of net energy billing to participating customers.

Maine has allowed customers with distributed renewable energy generation to use the power they produce to offset their electricity bill since the 1980s. In 2017, the Maine Public Utilities Commission amended its rules governing net energy billing to reduce the amount of power that a customer could net against its electric utility bill. The Commission did this by inventing a concept called "gross metering," which allowed electric utilities to collect charges even for power generated and consumed on-site in real time, while requiring participating customers to install a second meter.

The "gross metering" concept was controversial for a variety of reasons, including the fact that it deterred customer adoption of solar power and other distributed renewables (by adding costs while cutting compensation), and the fact that for the first time ever it allowed utilities to collect charges from customers for power produced and consumed entirely on the customer's premises even where that power never went on utility grid facilities.  The Commission later exempted most medium and large customers from this policy after finding that the cost of installing an extra meter wasn't justified, but left the gross metering requirements in its Rule Chapter 313 governing net energy billing. In response, in 2019 various state legislators proposed bills that would alter or restore the net energy billing paradigm.

One of these bills has now received favorable votes in both the state House and Senate. LD 91, An Act to Eliminate Gross Metering, was originally sponsored by Representative Seth Berry. It clarifies the statutory definition of net energy billing, which currently defines the concept as "a billing and metering practice under which a customer is billed on the basis of net energy over the billing period taking into account accumulated unused kilowatt-hour credits from the previous billing period." As amended by LD 91, the definition would specifically define "net energy" as the "difference between the kilowatt-hours delivered by a transmission and distribution utility to the customer over a billing period and the kilowatt-hours delivered by the customer to the transmission and distribution utility over the billing period." This clarification removes the Public Utilities Commission's ability to define "net energy" in any other way. LD 91 also directs the Commission to amend its rules "to be substantively equivalent to the rules in effect on January 1, 2017" (that is, before the Commission's 2017 regulatory amendment.)

LD 91 faces additional votes in the state legislature, before it would move to the desk of Governor Janet Mills for her signature. The legislature is also expected to consider other bills affecting net energy billing or expanding incentives for solar development, later this session.

Will Maine change its net metering law?

Several pieces of proposed Maine legislation could affect the state's version of net metering. Here's a quick look at Maine's net energy billing policy, how it could change, and what that might mean for consumers.

Maine's electricity rules allow consumers with certain distributed generation facilities (like solar panels) to elect "net energy billing." Like other forms of net metering, the basic concept is that consumers can use their on-site generation to offset their purchases of electricity from the grid, both in real time, and by banking credits for power exported to the grid during periods of time when on-site generation exceeds the consumer's load.

The Maine Public Utilities Commission first adopted a net energy billing rule in the 1980s, allowing customers to net imports and exports within any month or other billing period, in recognition that consumers should not be required to install an extra meter to measure exports from small renewable power facilities and other distributed generation. In 1998, the Commission revised its rule to allow annualized netting as a means of encouraging the use of small-scale renewable technologies designed primarily to serve the customer’s own needs.

In 2017, the Commission revised its rule to reduce the benefits of net metering for future projects, both by reducing the credit for nettable energy, and by shifting the state to a "gross metering" paradigm. Under gross metering, which has been called "one of the strangest and most regressive policies for valuing residential solar in the United States," utilities collect charges even for power generated and consumed on-site in real time. While the Commission later granted an exemption from its gross metering policy for most medium and large customers after finding that the cost of installing an extra meter (estimated at over $3,000 per installation) wasn't justified, the revised rule remains on the books for now.

But further possible changes to net energy billing figure among the numerous energy issues implicated by the list of legislation proposed for the Maine State Legislature's 2019 session. Several bills that have been printed so far suggest that the Legislature will consider various bills that would eliminate gross metering (like LD 91, An Act to Eliminate Gross Metering and LD 143, An Act To Protect Electric Ratepayers from Gross Output Metering Costs), or would replace net energy billing with a market-based mechanism (like LD 41, An Act To Replace Net Energy Billing with a Market-based Mechanism), among other measures. Other bill titles suggest possible changes to the state's policy on shared ownership net metering, which allows multiple customers to offset their load with generation from a community solar project or other off-site facility.

The Legislature's Joint Standing Committee on Energy, Utilities and Technology will schedule public hearings on these bills. The Committee has scheduled public hearings on LD 41 and LD 91 for 1:00 p.m. on January 29, 2019.

Maine net energy billing rules, 2017 revision

On January 31, 2017, the Maine Public Utilities Commission adopted revisions to its rule chapter 313, governing net energy billing.  Net metering, or net energy billing, is the metering and billing mechanism that Maine and most other states have adopted to promote the development of solar photovoltaic and other distributed renewable energy facilities.  While the Commission first adopted a net energy billing rule in the early 1980s, its 2017 revisions to that rule reduce the benefits of net metering for future projects.  Here's a look at Maine's revised net energy billing rules.

The Commission described its actions in a written order dated March 1, and published its final rule on the same date.   Most notably, the Commission reduced the amount of future generation facility output that can be netted against its transmission and distribution utility bill -- by first introducing, then reducing, a concept called "nettable energy."  Nettable energy is now the entire amount of energy generated by the facility, including the amount consumed by a customer “behind-the-meter”.  This shift -- from netting on a net basis, to netting on a gross basis -- is a significant change in state policy that is unfavorable for behind-the-meter generation.

As before, a net energy billing customer with solar or other eligible generation may offset all of its energy supply bill with its nettable energy.  But the Commission's new rule phases out the former 100% crediting of net energy for transmission and distribution charges.  Depending on the year into which a project is placed in service, the new rule reduces the portion of the "nettable output" -- what counts for netting -- by 10% in each of the next 10 years, reaching 0% T&D crediting for customers that become net energy billing customers after calendar year 2026.  The result is a gradual reduction of the incentive to net energy bill.  (Note that once a customer becomes a net energy billing customer, its rate treatment will generally last for 15 years.  Likewise, existing net energy billing customers may continue to net bill under the previous rule's approach for a 15-year period, after which they could continue to net for supply but not for T&D.)

The Commission also added a section covering renewable energy credit (REC) aggregation.  Section 4 of Chapter 313 provides that new customers in 2018 and after may elect to have the RECs or environmental attributes of project power be aggregated by their local investor-owned utility for sale into the regional market, with the proceeds returned to participating customers.  The Commission described its decision to include a REC aggregation program as "an effort to obtain on an optional basis a value stream that is not currently being monetized."  If small renewable projects would qualify for RECs, but are either not doing so or are not selling the RECs, REC aggregation options may allow some projects to connect with the market.  On the other hand, by selling the RECs, the project owner or power consumer cannot claim to have consumed green electricity, so there are tradeoffs.

The Commission did not change some other aspects of the rule, such as maximum project size (660 kW) or its limit on the number of accounts or meters permissible under a single net energy billing arrangement (10).  It noted, "Fundamental changes to NEB in Maine and promotional programs for larger renewable and community solar projects are the purview of the Legislature as a matter of State energy policy."

Based on a list of legislative requests, the state legislature will consider at least 12 bills relating to solar energy in its 2017 session.

On March 10, the Commission published a Frequently Asked Questions document covering the Chapter 313 net metering rules.  The FAQ provides answers to 10 questions, ranging from why the Commission changed the rule, to providing specific examples of how much nettable energy a customer would be able to claim depending on the year in which its project was placed in service.