5C: Benefits and barriers to moving toward net-100% renewable electricity

Working independently of state goals, 18 Utah communities are voluntarily engaged in the Community Renewable Energy Program (CREP), representing about 25% of Utah’s electricity demand. The program is an effort to achieve net-100% renewable electricity by 2030 and is the first of its kind in the nation. While communities participating in the program will not run completely on clean energy by the deadline, their efforts are projected to build enough new renewable sources across Rocky Mountain Power’s system to offset participants’ total annual electricity demand. The program creates a market-based motivation for renewable development by leveraging a large block of customers to work with their monopoly utility to meet renewable demand at a manageable price.

Researchers investigated how Salt Lake City, Park City, and Moab enacted net-100% renewable electricity resolutions, prompting the Utah Legislature to pass the Community Renewable Energy Act of 2019, which established an avenue for communities and Rocky Mountain Power to create the program. Twenty-three communities in Utah took the first step, but five have since dropped out of the program, concerned with administrative costs, impacts on electricity rates (communities are currently negotiating the program’s rates with Rocky Mountain Power), and plans by Rocky Mountain to develop renewable energy sources independently of the program.

Wind and solar are among today’s most cost-effective electricity sources, especially as issues of base load and energy storage continue to be addressed. In addition to creating better air quality in the state, renewable energy offers price stability while taking virtually no water from drought-prone systems and helping to mitigate climate change. This research is an important step into uncovering why some groups left the program and articulating lessons learned for ways communities and utilities can better collaborate to pursue net-100% renewable electricity.