'Solar Guy' packs Kalispell brewery for energy-policy talk

“Net metering” might not sound like a classic barn-burner of a presentation topic. But scores of Flathead residents packed into Kalispell Brewing Co.’s taproom Tuesday afternoon for an hour-long talk on the issue, along with other renewable-energy policies up for debate before the Montana Legislature.

Solar power currently makes up a tiny proportion of Montana’s energy sector — totaling less than 0.1 percent, according to the state Public Service Commission. But increasingly, small businesses and residents throughout the state are looking to the sun to offset their electricity bills.

Owners of small-scale solar arrays are referred to as “dispersed generators,” and when they produce more power than they need, they can push those watts back onto the electric grid and have it credited toward their power costs when the sun isn’t shining.

The price at which those “net metering” customers are credited, and how much solar power they can produce, is the subject of several bills winding through the current Legislature.

On Tuesday, Kalispell was the third stop in a statewide tour featuring “Solar Guy” Brad Van Wert, a Bozeman solar installer stumping for policies that support renewable energy production in Montana. Asking the crowd to urge their state lawmakers to support solar-friendly legislation, he described Montana as harboring “big potential” for renewable energy.

“How many people out here cut firewood to warm your homes, or grow a garden, or walk around in the mountains looking for elk to fill your freezer?” Van Wert asked. “This is part of the spirit of independence as Montanans. This is home-grown energy.”

WHILE NINE bills tackling net metering have already surfaced in the Legislature this session, Van Wert took aim at Senate Bill 78, sponsored by Rep. Keith Regier, R-Kalispell. One of the session’s most sweeping proposals on net metering, Van Wert described it as a policy “that would absolutely dismantle net metering as we know it.”

The bill would substantially reduce the value of surplus energy credited back to new net-metering generators.

Currently, those credits are valued at the utility company’s retail rate, or the amount it charges to customers. Under Regier’s bill, that amount would switch to the utility’s wholesale rate, which Northwestern Energy says is less than one-third of that retail value: around 3 cents per kilowatt-hour, versus 11.5 cents for retail in January.

Last week the bill received its first hearing before the Senate Energy and Telecommunications Committee. Regier argued that the current system amounts to a subsidy paid by utility companies, which bear the costs of producing consistent electricity and of operations and maintenance for power grid infrastructure.

“I like to raise our own vegetables to make me more self-sufficient,” Regier told the legislative panel. “But people would think it absurd for me to take my surplus produce to the grocery store, and have the store pay me the full retail price they get when they sell to the public. Yet that’s what Montana has with its current net-metering laws.”

Van Wert was one of several opponents to the bill that testified during the Jan. 26 hearing. He contended that those solar producers already pay the added costs through their role as utility customers.

“What we fail to recognize is that net-generating customers do not just come out of thin air,” he said. “They are in fact rate payers, Montana rate payers, Northwestern Energy rate payers, and many of them [with] 30-plus years of doing so.”

While Regier’s measure includes a provision that grandfathers in credits for existing net-metering customers at the retail cost, Van Wert said his proposal would penalize new solar energy producers.

Lobbyists for Northwestern Energy and Montana-Dakota Utilities testified in support of the bill. John Alke, representing Northwestern, said the current law requires utilities to subsidize net-metering customers and argued that the current scenario fails to account for the inconsistent supply generated by solar power, which depends on the weather and the time of day.

During his presentation on Tuesday, however, Van Wert called the current arrangement a “fair deal,” and said promoting the growth of solar power in the state has benefits beyond those to private generators.

“I hire a team of 10 guys, I sub-contract with roofers and electricians, rent local equipment and buy all sorts of stuff. I’m talking about really cool projects that benefit Montanans,” he said, also referring to the environmental impacts from extracting and burning fossil fuels for energy.

According to the Solar Energy Industry Association, 37 solar companies in Montana employed 300 people in 2014. Van Wert said the state needs to embrace policies that grow that sector, which he said employs 300,000 people throughout the United States.

IN AN interview after his talk, Van Wert acknowledged the system of crediting net-metering customers is not perfect. But he also noted that the legislative interim committee tasked with reviewing the policy over the last two years failed to determine a fair price.

In its final report to the Legislature, the Energy and Transportation Interim Committee wrote that resolving the costs and benefits of net metering “ultimately became a question to be answered in the future,” and suggest it be resolved by the state Public Service Commission.

The report noted that net-metering use in Montana has grown by 20 to 30 percent annually in recent years, a pace that would push the sector to 1 percent of the states overall energy supply as soon as 2023.

The “Solar Guy Whistle-stop Tour” is part of the Charge MT campaign, funded by several organizations lobbying for renewable-energy policies, including Renewable Northwest, the Montana Renewable Energy Association, the Northwest Energy Coalition and the Forward Montana Foundation.

For more information, visit http://www.chargemt.org/.

Reporter Sam Wilson can be reached at 758-4407 or by email at swilson@dailyinterlake.com.