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Committee approves retroactive Clean Power SF contracts with PG&E and narrows PUC arbitration authority with sunset
Summary
The committee recommended retroactive approval of three Clean Power SF resource‑adequacy contracts with PG&E totaling $13.7 million and accepted an amendment adding a five‑year sunset to proposed delegated authority for the PUC general manager to enter future arbitration clauses.
The Budget & Finance Committee on Sept. 13 recommended that the Board retroactively approve three resource‑adequacy contracts executed by the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission with Pacific Gas & Electric Company and adopted an amendment narrowing the PUC’s delegated authority.
Michael Himes, director of Clean Power SF at the SFPUC, told the committee the three short‑term contracts run from August 2018 through December 2020 and together total $13,700,000. He said the agreements include PG&E‑required binding arbitration clauses; because binding arbitration shifts dispute‑resolution terms, the Board’s approval is required. Himes said the contracts were executed by the PUC general manager to secure needed resource adequacy quantities and avoid potential state penalties the PUC estimated could have been as high as $14,000,000 if capacity had not been secured.
Severn Campbell of the Budget Legislative Analyst explained the ordinance has two parts: retroactive approval of the specific contracts and delegation of authority to the PUC general manager to enter future arbitration clauses under narrow conditions (only when purchases are necessary to meet a legal requirement and no non‑arbitration option is available). The BLA flagged that delegating the Board’s authority is a policy question.
Public comment raised concerns that PG&E could acquire too large a market position. To preserve Board oversight while allowing the PUC to operate, Chair Cohen circulated an amendment that would sunset the delegated authority after five years; the committee accepted the amendment and forwarded the item to the full Board with a positive recommendation.
The committee record identifies the contracts as resource adequacy purchases intended to meet state requirements and notes the ordinance would also delegate limited authority to the PUC general manager for future contracts meeting narrow conditions. The committee did not quantify long‑term fiscal impacts of broader delegation, noting that future contracts would be limited to narrowly defined cases.
