April 1, 2019
LAST CALL - ENERGY COUNCIL MEETING - APRIL 2
The Energy Council will welcome House Public Utilities Chairman Walsh and Senate Energy and Public Utilities Chairman Cunningham to our next meeting on April 2nd in Springfield. The legislators will provide an update of ongoing energy issues before the General Assembly. The meeting will be hosted by the Illinois Municipal Electric Agency at 3400 Conifer Dr, Springfield from 10.30a-12pm. Please RSVP here.
SPRINGFIELD
It was the House deadline for bills out of committee, which meant a flurry of activity in committees to get member's legislative priorities through the deadline and keep rolling through the process. A number of bills remaining in committee will be referred back to the Rules committee and theoretically dead. Members can request extensions of their bills and we'll know more this week if some bills we are concerned with still have legs. Bills being re-referred back to Rules are posting now. Out of a lot of the bills we are monitoring though, what we expected to moved, moved, and ones we were working to oppose didn't, for the most part. I'll run through the week usual list.
Tuesday:
House Public Utilities passed HB2861 (Walsh). At this time, the bill would allow ComEd to utilize a mechanism at PJM to acquire its own capacity, which would be done through the Illinois Power Agency. The bill lays out what capacity shall be purchased, requiring the bulk of it to come from "clean capacity". There are a lot of placeholders in the legislation however, so there are still a lot of unknowns. While we understand the bill will receive additional amendments, the proposal is still a major change that could have significant cost implications for the state and ratepayers and is a shift away from the markets. Further, we are awaiting a ruling from FERC addressing this issue and there are questions to the urgency being pushed by the proponents. The Chamber testified in opposition to the bill, sharing those points. If a package surfaces, this bill will be part of that. More below.
HB2713
, Amdt 1, the Coal to Solar and Energy Storage Act, passed House Public Utilities on Thursday. This is a new bill, introduced on Wednesday. The bill would seek to redevelop downstate coal plants into utility-scale solar and energy storage facilities, requiring the IPA to award 15-year contracts to procure renewable generation to be built at existing coal plants. The generation must come online between 2021 and 2022. Coal facilities meeting certain requirements would receive "transitional assistance", allowing roughly 60% of downstate coal plants to remain open through 2024, rather than shuttering quickly. Plants would have to retire between 2025 and 2030. An energy storage grant program would also be created.
HB1633
(Hoffman) passed House Judiciary-Criminal 13-6. The Chamber supported the bill, which would impose stricter criminal penalties on a person who knowingly damages critical infrastructure such as pipelines, railways, transmission, etc. The bill has been amended to lower the criminal penalties from a Class 1 to Class 3 penalty and add coal mines to the definition of critical infrastructure. An additional amendment, amendment 2, has been filed to switch "knowingly" to "intentionally", further ensuring the bill impacts those who seek to damage critical infrastructure assets. While Judiciary-Criminal met again on Thursday, the second amendment was not considered, but the bill is on 2nd reading.
House Energy and Environment passed a number of bills to the floor. Some were agreed to come back for further negotiation, however. Of the ones we were monitoring or took a position on: HB2491 (Walsh) which establishes a process to reuse plastic. The Chamber supported the bill.
HB2966
(Davis), the Path to 100 Act and HB3624 (Williams), the Clean Energy Jobs Act. The Chamber is opposed to HB3624.
Package Talk:
As we all know, negotiations will occur on these two bills and HB2861. Other parts of the package could include utility formula rate extensions and the Coal to Solar and Energy Storage Act, which was introduced this week. Discussions are happening among some of the proponents, but when a broader conversation begins will likely happen after the spring break. (Come to our Energy Council meeting and talk to the Chairmen about those conversations!) Therefore, it's still unknown when a package may surface. Currently, the Chamber is opposed to HB3624 and HB2861, as both of those proposals could upend the competitive electricity marketplace, resulting in rate increases for all rate classes and impacting electric reliability for residents and business users, particularly those energy intensive users. Further, we have concerns with efforts to decarbonize the electricity sector by 2030 and the probability of doing so without spurring rate increases and reliability issues. Couple that with calls to electrify the transportation network - the increased loads could not be supported without baseload generation resources at this time.
Floor Activity:
HB 2764
(Hurley) passed unanimously. Amends the Environmental Protection Act. Provides that when manifests are required by the Pollution Control Board for the shipment of nonhazardous special waste, the manifests shall consist of forms prescribed by the Environmental Protection Agency, rather than being identical to manifests required for the shipment of hazardous waste. The Chamber is in support of this legislation.
HB3481
(Gabel) passed the House on Thursday. The bill repeals the Kyoto Protocol, which restricted the State from regulating greenhouse gas emissions. The Chamber is opposed to this concept as any attempt to regulate greenhouse gases should be a national approach. Further, if this were done at the state level, it should not come at the discretion of state agencies without any input from the legislature.
Senate
Wednesday:
SB 1407
, Amdt 2 (Hastings) passed the Senate Executive Committee, 12-5-0. The amendment, offered by Senator Koehler, adds ethanol facilities to Senator Hastings bill. The underlying bill creates the Illinois Hazardous Materials Workforce Training Act requiring all construction and maintenance work at privately owned petroleum refineries and petrochemical facilities within the state to be exclusively performed by members of certain trade unions. SB1407 passed Committee last week. The Chamber is opposed.
Thursday:
The Senate Energy and Public Utilities Committee passed two bills SB1570 (Rezin) impacts the JULIE program and SB2123 (Peters), the Renewable Energy Pay As You Save Program which allows utility customers to purchase renewable energy and energy storage systems with no upfront payment and to pay for those costs over time on their utility bill.
The Committee also held a subject matter hearing on SB2132 (Castro) and SB1781 (Cunningham), the debate was similar to the debate heard in the House last week. Members asked questions on the impact to reliability needs of users across the state. The proponents of the legislation shared similar testimony to the House hearing. Testimony was also received from more opponents expressing concerns over the costs the bills could have on ratepayers. The Chamber is opposed to SB2132. The deadline for those bills was yesterday and both have been referred back to the Committee on Assignments. It's likely the House versions will be the package vehicles.
Floor Activity:
The full Senate also moved HB2988 (Williams) to 3rd reading. The impacts county zoning rules for wind farms. The bill passed the House on Tuesday.
The Senate also passed SB1847 (Munoz) unanimously today. This legislation would amend the Environmental Protection Act to provides that the Environmental Protection Agency shall provide notice when a permit for a new facility is required. The Chamber provided agreed language and was neutral on its passage. The bill now heads to the House and Rep. Mah has taken the bill.
What Didn't Happen and Why We Like That:
HB2893
(Gong-Gerschowtiz) was not called in House Judiciary-Civil by the bill's sponsor and has been referred back to Rules. We did a lot of leg work to keep the bill from being called and appreciate the support and work from our coalition members. We'll stay diligent if the bill language finds its way in a different form.
HB2728
(Mah) was not called and has been referred back to Rules. The bill provides that the IEPA shall consider adverse impacts on environmental justice communities relating to granting a permit or permit renewal before publishing a draft permit for public comment. The bill would codify environmental justice policies that the IEPA considers now and adds requirements beyond current practices. The Chamber is opposed.
HB1449
(Bennett) was not called in House Counties & Townships and referred back to Rules. The Chamber is opposed to the bill, which would allow a county to deny a special use permit by vote. Currently, if a county receives a permit from the zoning board it can either approve or send the permit back to the zoning board for changes. The Chamber is opposed to the bill out of concern for the broad implications the bill could have on projects around the state as it would impact any entity seeking a special use permit. Projects seeking special use permits and zoning approval should not be subject to unknown factors such as a county board decision, which can often be driven by politics. Permits should be considered subject to the conditions set forth by the permit requirements. Rep. Bennett was very gracious in trying to work with us to find a resolution, but ultimately we weren't able to get there.
HB3382 (Diedrich) imposes a tax upon the severance and preparation of coal at 5% of the gross value of the severed coal. The Chamber was opposed and the bill has been referred back to the Rules Committee.
For the full list of what happened last week, including the bills that have been referred back to the Rules Committee, see our tracked bill list here.
Next Week
As for next week, neither the House nor Senate have posted hearings of note for the Energy Council. There are a lot of subject matter hearings posted. The House is in session Tuesday through Thursday and the Senate is in Wednesday through Friday.
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