SCE and Renewable Energy

Disclaimer - I did have an interview with SCE for a position a couple of months ago. I did not get the job (bummer), but it was a great learning experience. It's a subject I am very interested in and they had me interview with five people and I got a lot of great information. I even got a tour showing their trading floor where they buy energy.

SCE is a utility that needs to obey the California Public Utility Commission (CPUC) and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). Basically they have a box that they need to stay within. There is no incentive for them in the design for reducing costs. Currently they get a guaranteed profit and need to supply the electricity needed within California per the rates that have been approved by the CPUC.

All SCE controls currently is the purchasing of electricity (often on multi-year contracts), transmission lines, and the billing of customers. Under deregulation the power plants were taken away from them. Some were sold to other companies, and others were put into a separate organization. Currently SCE has mandates on purchasing a certain amount of renewable power (20% by 2010 and 33% by 2020). California power transmission infrastructure needs help, and was the cause of some of the power problems. A challenge with windpower, is the best places for wind power usually don't have the needed transmission lines for sending the power to where it's needed. Edison is building in the Tehachapi (just North of Los Angeles) power lines that are needed for this. The challenge of building power lines is if not buried (which costs more), they impact the view. SCE has also been funding CFL's to increase the adoption of them within their area. They are also looking for ways to store energy so it can be used at night. The problem with solar and wind is it works great during the day. Current storage mechanisms such as batteries have a high cost (only lasting five years) and are not feasible for the levels Edison needs.