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With storage in mind, Nevada OKs optional time-of-use rates for solar customers

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With storage in mind, Nevada OKs optional time-of-use rates for solar customers

Nevada regulators approved an agreement between NV Energy Inc. and solar advocates setting out new optional time-of-use rates for solar customers with the aim of encouraging the installation of energy storage equipment.

Public Utilities Commission Chairman Joe Reynolds said the agreement closes the book on the "solar wars" in Nevada, a long-running fight between NV Energy and rooftop solar companies that at one point brought an end to net metering. The practice allows rooftop solar customers to sell their power back to the grid.

Passage of Assembly Bill 405 last year largely restored net metering rule and required that Nevada Power Co. and Sierra Pacific Power Co. implement optional time-variant rate schedules for customers with solar and energy storage equipment installed at their homes and businesses.

With this agreement, which the PUC approved on March 14, Reynolds said the parties "are pushing the envelope in trying some new ideas."

The order applies to all solar customers, even those without storage equipment, but is specifically intended to encourage customer-sited solar in combination with storage, PUC spokesman Peter Kostes said.

Specifically, the agreement provides options for solar customers with and without battery storage to take time-of-use rates with peak and off-peak consumption rates that also vary with weekends and seasons. Customers would also pay a demand rate based on their maximum consumption over 15 minute periods in return for a reduction in a monthly basic service charge and a uniform lower kilowatt-hour consumption rate. The optional rate schedules will be implemented on Oct. 1.

Solar customers could see their costs decline under the new time-of-use rates by shifting their demand from the grid to off-peak hours, while utilities would benefit by reducing demand at peak hours.

The agreement also provides customer protections, including a "best-bill guarantee” for customers that take the optional time-of-use rates. Customers could return to the utility's default rate or switch to a different time-of-use rate if they do not realize a savings within 12 months. The statute requires the new optional rate schedules to be approved by March 15, he said.

Parties to the agreement included the utilities, PUC staff, the Nevada Attorney General's Bureau of Consumer Protection, Tesla Inc., Sunrun Inc., Vivint Solar Inc., Nevadans for Clean Affordable Energy and Vote Solar. The last two parties are solar advocacy groups.

Reynolds pointed to Tesla's development of the world's largest lithium ion battery production plant called the Gigafactory as a big part of Nevada's future in which customers will charge batteries in their homes and vehicles with solar energy.

Tesla attorney Curt Ledford told the commissioners the agreement provides a great opportunity for Nevada customers to explore the use of battery storage with an innovative program. (Nevada Case No. 17-07026)