Huntington Beach exits OCPA

Huntington Beach left because of:

1.    lack of transparency — unwillingness to show its CAISO Settlement Statements to member representative (these statements identify the actual volume of brown power in OCPA’s energy portfolio, proving how green OCPA really is);

2.    escalating costs that OCPA continued to ratchet up to JUST below Southern California Edison prices (even though majority of OCPA’s energy contracts were locked in place);

3.    inability to secure “resource adequacy” (RA).  RA is gas-fired energy that stabilizes the electric grid.   OCPA had twice claimed it would “meet or exceed” this statutory mandate in filings with utility commission;

4.    inability secure mandated Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) contract volumes (65% of renewable energy contracts must be 10-years or longer) after twice claiming it would “meet or exceed” this statutory mandate in filings with utility commission;

5.    hiring a CEO with zero experience – at the first board meeting the fellow asked what a “KWh” was – a kilowatt-hour is the basic energy billing metric on consumer bills;

6.    operations that triggered 4 audits in less than a year of operation;  etc.

OCPA is controlled by Pacific Energy Advisors which also controls these community choice energy agencies and, of note, 3CE, San Diego Community Power, and MCE.

Action item

Tell your city to NOT join any CCA

IF your city is already in a CCA,demand that your Community Choice Energy agency publicly release copies of (i) CAISO Settlement Statements, 

(ii) copies of energy re-sale invoices, and (iii) copies of energy procurement invoices.  Redact prices.  This will allow you to determine “renewable”

energy content of your agency.  Otherwise — are you buying a black box?  

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Get the free report, Community Choice Aggregation: A False Choice