Electrification element in climate plan dead on arrival

By Walter Sadler

Special to The Enterprise

Many residents of Davis support electrification of residential and commercial units as necessary to address climate change and achieve the city’s stated objective of being carbon neutral by 2040.

City staff and consultants have developed the “2020-2040 Climate Action & Adaptation Plan,” which identified residential and commercial electrification as an element to be accomplished by the property owner; however, the current approach proposed to achieve this objective, voluntary compliance, will not achieve a significant degree of compliance.

A recent commentary in the Davis Enterprise titled, “City’s climate plan puts cart before the horse,” by Nick Marin was right on target regarding the concept of mandatory requirement of electrification as the city’s implementation strategy, or lack thereof, and summed up a lot of the obvious issues, with emphasis on costs. However, it only touched on what is the largest hurdle to implementation: “upgrade your electrical panel to include one or more additional 240v circuits.” Upgrading an electrical panel will be an issue of significant cost and complexity throughout the city and in most cases involves upgrades to PG&Es system before the panel upgrade, thus the homeowner is not in control.

There is a significant difference between working with PG&E on the Solar Program and the proposed Electrification Program. For solar the costs, potential for rate relief and regulatory requirements (PUC and city of Davis) are easily identified up front and the owner gets a return on the investment.

Electrification of residential is more complex and there are a lot of unknowns and regulatory hurdles with no identifiable short-term return on investment other than the emotional satisfaction of participating in the city’s efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Electrification of residential and commercial units as identified in the Plan together with all the other elements are all missing one key component, an implemintation strategy and identification of realistic compliance goal.

Elements key to implementation of the electrification plan include: identification and coordination of regulatory requirements of the city (Building Codes), Public Utilities Commission (PUC), PG&E and the IRS; determination that PG&E can supply the power to the area in question with existing facilities; financing strategies that identify the least cost to the property owner and acceptable cost impacts to the utility; identification of realistic measurable goals; and property owner acceptance with the costs and benefits clarified and identified, future and present.

As proposed, voluntary compliance will get minimal engagement by the individual property owners due to uncertainties regarding the potential for high costs and the bureaucratic barriers that the individual homeowner or commercial property owner will face.

Key among those barriers is the PUC and PG&E, an investorowned utility that currently has higher priorities (PUC directed) than the application of a single residence or commercial property for a service upgrade.

I own a single-family home in Davis, in University Estates near the high school, that was developed in the 1970s and 1980s with underground services. It is typical that services installed during this time frame are 100 amps and fed by direct burial cables. Today, an all-electric house typically requires a 200amp service, which is the standard for new homes.

I have an all-electric kitchen with an induction range, 240v; AC, 240v; pool pump, 240v, gas clothes dryer, gas water heater, electric vehicle, etc. Updating my electric service to 200 amps would cost me approximately $35,000 to $40,000. For that reason, I charge my EV on a 110v circuit (4 miles per hour of charge). The reason for this high cost is that there are no existing conduits or pull boxes for PG&E to use to upgrade their power feed to my meter; therefore, I would have to pay for the installation of the conduits and pull boxes, together with the relocation of my electric meter or possible abandonment of my gas service due to current design requirements.

PG&E as an investor-owned utility has a variety of PUCapproved to define responsibilities for who pays for new or upgraded services, undergrounding, design standards (Green Book), etc. As with any business or municipality, nothing is free — either you pay an upfront cost or they recoup their costs in their rate schedule.

PG&E works with cities when an area is going to be undergrounded with the costs being borne by the applicant and upon completion the facilities are donated to PG&E together with the required state and federal taxes. So, the policies and procedures for upgrading services are not new to PG&E; however, a

icymi: our Top 5 sTories of The week

n Three UCD students dead in San Joaquin County highway crash: http://wp.me/p3aczg-4imZ n Man accused of grand theft in Davis: http://wp.me/p3aczg-4inh n Vaitla appeals approval of University Mall redevelopment: http://wp.me/p3aczg-4imm n Basketball: Gonzalez resigns as DHS boys head coach: http://wp.me/p3aczg-3ddM public agency must take the lead.

Upon reviewing the consultant’s scope of work for the CAAP, and the qualifications of the consulting team, it is obvious that implementation of electrification was never considered in any framework other than public outreach and mandatory compliance with no costs provided.This is verified by the language in the Implementation Roadmaps regarding next steps.

Consultants and staff, by their recommendations, seem to be hooked on the drug OPM, commonly known in the consulting community as other people’s money, i.e. grants. Somehow Davis has become an impoverished community and is going to get significant Grants? Without an idea of costs, how do you apply for anything other than a planning grant?

Here is a strategy. Using PG&E’s system maps and customer records, the consulting team could identify the number of services in the various service categories, underground, direct burial and overhead, that need to be upgraded. Using this data, they could select a service area for each type of service and develop a representative cost estimate for each house within the service area.

Using these costs, they could then develop some financing strategies, such as an improvement district funded by municipal bonds, etc. to develop an annual cost estimate for a service upgrade in each category.Then the City Council and voters (homeowners) would have something realistic to consider. This would also provide the opportunity for the consultant to consider other technological alternatives that might be more cost effective and acceptable to the homeowner, such as load n The Yolo Berries taste like Yolo Berries! http://wp.me/p3aczg-4ilx shedding.

In other words, I don’t use my induction range at night. Could I use those amps for another use? Maybe I pay for carbon credits that the city uses to help address vehicle emissions. The city must take the lead, and everyone located in the designated PG&E service area must participate.

The CAAP as proposed is flexible according to staff. When faced with divisive policies or issues the mantra of staff and politicians is, typically, “Indecision is the key to flexibility.” Without an identified implementation strategy that will accomplish the objectives required, no one can be faulted for making a bad decision or a decision that needs to be corrected if no decision is made.

Putting the total burden of achieving the goal of residential electrification onto the individual property owner fits that criterion. Box checked, move on. Next item on the agenda, we will revisit this in the future. The original schedule for the CAAP called for completion in December 2021 with no clear implementable plan. We are now into 2023 and the city and state are trying to meet state- and citystated objectives approaching on an accelerated schedule.

The city still has the mandatory approach on the agenda for 2026 according to their Implementation Roadmap in Appendix A. Without a realistic implementation strategy that is cost effective and the city of Davis taking an aggressive lead, then the 2020-2040 CAAP becomes just another plan on the shelf.

— Walter Sadler is a retired civil engineer with experience working in utilities in the public and private (investor-owned) environment.

Editors’ choice for web comment of the week

“That’s really unfortunate. I think to have a mixed residential and commercial space would really being the University Mall area back ... that and the Grad.”

From Dana Marsh

In response to “Approval of ... University Mall redevelopment impacts Housing Element”