Why are Schools, Hospitals, Government, Small Business Hurting in San Diego? by Lane Sharman, Executive Director
SDG&E rate increases in 2013 and 2014 killed all budget projections from the finance department. Did you know that a utility has a normal duty to make rate increases from year to year moderate? That is one of the abiding tenants behind the operation of a "Natural Monopoly". But, hey, SDG&E gets a pass from many of its friends in high places in San Diego and to see who some them are, be sure and check out the UT article (right).
Further, SDG&E loaded all of its rate increases for non-residential into the Solar Bypass Tariff. Schools, government and businesses that invested in Solar get to watch their SDG&E bills increase in spite of significant investment in local energy generation.
How to combat the Solar Bypass Tariff? Implement energy storage. Along with Elon Musk and Tesla, innovators all over the world are gearing up to make energy storage the cheap and reliable way to store energy and make it available when you need it. It's all about managing the Demand Charge, the Solar Bypass Tariff.
Schools that have invested in solar need to make one more investment so as to get control over the Solar Bypass Tariff aka the SDG&E Demand Charge, one of the highest in the world.
