A majority of California voters have not yet realized that the people they’re electing are causing the problems they’re having.
There have been a few signs that the word may be getting out. You may remember the eruption of fury in the spring of 2023 over a new plan to charge electricity rates based on household income. The rage was directed at the investor-owned utilities that announced the new pricing, but the income-based rates were mandated by a provision in a state law, Assembly Bill 205 in 2022.
AB 205 was a lengthy budget trailer bill. Let me tell you about those. Every year, the Assembly and Senate each pass a stack of blank bills, containing only a bill number and one sentence about the intent to pass a bill later.
Lawmakers vote on the blank bills in the budget committee and on the floor. Then the blank bills go on the shelf until after the budget is passed. When deals are made in a back room at the eleventh hour, the text of every deal goes onto one of these blank bills as an “amendment.” There are no policy committee hearings, no debate, just an up-or-down vote to approve the “amendment” and then straight to the governor’s desk for his signature.
This is how they do it in California. AB 205 was the “energy trailer bill” in 2022. It went from a one-sentence bill on June 25 to 18,817 words on June 26. It was signed into law on June 30.
Months later, when the public found out about the income-graduated rates, some Democrats rushed to the microphones to denounce the idea, even though they had voted for it less than a year earlier.
Republicans had opposed the income-based rates and voted against AB 205, but in Sacramento, Republicans don’t have enough votes to block a sidewalk.
That may change. Californians are furious about their utility bills. The California Public Utilities Commission pushed off the income-graduated rates and substituted a higher fixed charge for most customers. Then last year, the CPUC approved six rate hikes within 12 months for customers of Pacific Gas & Electric. Public anger boiled over.
Gov. Gavin Newsom responded by ordering reports. On Oct. 30, he directed the CPUC and the California Energy Commission to report back to him by Jan. 1 with a list of ways to lower electricity bills for state residents.
Those reports were not made public at first, but Sacramento’s KCRA 3 Capitol Correspondent Ashley Zavala pried them out of the administration.
Essentially, the reports say electricity rates are high because California laws require it.
The reports read like a catalog of stupid choices and inevitable consequences. For example, the CPUC report says ratepayers are responsible for California’s “climate goals in the energy sector,” meaning your electricity bill goes up to pay for green mandates. At the same time, you have to pay to maintain access to the more reliable power that’s needed every day when the sun goes down.
Ratepayers are footing the bill for laws that require utilities to sign costly long-term contracts for solar, wind and miscellaneous technologies that meet the state’s Renewables Portfolio Standard (RPS). The long-term contracts are no bargain. “In 2024, ratepayers paid an estimated $1.2 billion more than they would pay today for RPS contracts signed between the years 2000 and 2016,” the CPUC reported.
The report actually boasts that “electricity bills have been the vehicle to fund the incubation and commercialization of technologies.” That’s another way of saying ratepayers are getting the bill for research and development costs that will make somebody else rich, or not. Either way, they’re gambling with your money, and all you get out of it is a rate increase.
The report from the California Energy Commission brags about the Statewide Codes & Standards Program, which is paid for by customers of PG&E, Southern California Edison, San Diego Gas & Electric, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power and the Sacramento Municipal Utility District. At great expense, the program continuously determines and eventually mandates the latest “efficiency” standards in buildings and appliances. This, we are told, will reduce greenhouse gas emissions and prevent climate change.
According to the CEC’s report, the 2025 efficiency code updates will reduce greenhouse gas emissions by about 4 million metric tons over 30 years.
For perspective, wildfires in California released an estimated 127 million metric tons of greenhouse gases in 2020 alone.
Why are wildfires so much worse in the last 15-20 years? Is it because not enough Californians bought new energy-efficient dishwashers? Or is it because land management practices were changed 25 years ago due to new “smoke management” regulations from the California Air Resources Board, which decided that controlled burns for wildfire mitigation caused unhealthful air pollution?
Meanwhile, the cost of wildfires and wildfire mitigation is another reason electricity rates are high in California. Ratepayers get the bill. And everybody’s rates are higher due to cost-shifting that results from customers with rooftop solar panels not buying as much electricity from the grid.
The reports demonstrate that California’s laws are causing California’s problems. The regulators are just the bearers of bad news. So it was almost comical to see state senators grilling regulators in a hearing this week about the high rates, as if the lawmakers had no idea they had caused the problem themselves.
“The Legislature can also take statutory action to repeal or significantly revise mandated electricity programs that result in ratepayer costs that are higher than necessary for safe, reliable, clean electricity,” the CPUC report gently suggested.
Don’t hold your breath. California Democrats are determined to lead the world on climate policy, even if it takes every cent you have.
Write Susan@SusanShelley.com and follow her on X @Susan_Shelley