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Community Choice Aggregation Feasibility Analysis Alameda County June, 2016 1 MRW & Associates, LLC Chapter 1: Introduction The Alameda County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously in June, 2014 to allocate funding to explore the creation of a Community Choice Aggregation (CCA) Program and directed County staff to undertake the steps necessary to evaluate the feasibility of a CCA. This Technical Study is in response to that Board Action. What is a CCA? California Assembly Bill 117, passed in 2002, established Community Choice Aggregation in California, for the purpose of providing the opportunity for local governments or special jurisdictions to procure or provide electric power for their residents and businesses. Under existing rules administered by the California Public Utilities Commission PG&E must use its transmission and distribution system to deliver the electricity supplied by a CCA in a non- discriminatory manner. That is, it must provide these delivery services at the same price and at the same level of reliability to customers taking their power from a CCA as it does for its own full-service customers. By state law, PG&E also must provide all metering and billing services, its customers receiving a single electric bill each month from PG&E, which would differentiate the charges for generation services provided by the CCA as well as charges for PG&E delivery services. Money collected by PG&E on behalf of the CCA is remitted in a timely fashion (e.g., within 3 business days). As a power provider, the CCA must abide by the rules and regulations placed on it by the state and its regulating agencies, such as maintaining demonstrably reliable supplies and fully cooperating with the State’s power grid operator. However, the State has no rate-setting authority over the CCA; the CCA may set rates as it sees fit so as to best serve its constituent customers. Per California law, when a CCA is formed all of the electric customers within its boundaries will be placed, by default, onto CCA service. However, customers retain the right to return to PG&E service at will, subject to whatever administrative fees the CCA may choose to impose. California currently has four active CCA Programs: MCE Clean Energy, serving Marin County and selected neighboring jurisdictions; Sonoma Clean Power, serving Sonoma County, CleanPowerSF, serving San Francisco City and County, and Lancaster Choice Energy, serving the City of Lancaster (Los Angeles County). Numerous other local governments are also investigating CCA formation, including Los Angeles County, San Mateo County, Monterey Bay region, Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo and Ventura Counties; and Lake County to name but a few. Assessing CCA Feasibility In order to assess whether a CCA is “feasible” in Alameda County, the local objectives must be laid out and understood. Based on the specifications of the initial request for proposals and input from the County, this study:  Quantifies the electric loads that an Alameda County CCA would have to serve.  Estimates the costs to start-up and operate the CCA.