Bryan City Council voted July 14 to approve an amendment to the Bryan Texas Utilities solar compensation models, attempting to create more equitable energy prices for customers.
How it happened
According to the council discussion, BTU had been paying a fixed price for excess solar energy produced and then sold to BTU by homes and businesses with panels installed on their property prior to the amendment. The city estimated 815 total solar customers, approximately a little over 1% of all BTU customers.
The new ordinance is set to change the payment for solar kilowatt-hours from $0.1144 to $0.0376. BTU also estimates it had been overpaying customers for excess solar energy compared to the average ERCOT price, with as much as 5.3 times higher than the average during peak generation hours.
Doug Lyles, interim general manager for BTU, clarified a transition model for current solar customers, allowing up to six years, depending on when the panels were installed, to continue with the fixed-price model. He said customers bought their solar panels during a time when the compensation model was different, so they should receive a grace period.
“The transition hopefully helps with the expectation of fairness with all of our customers,” Lyles said.
What residents are saying
Existing solar customers spoke to the council before the formal presentation, voicing their concerns about the investment and the future of renewable energy in Bryan.
Paul Atkinson, a ranch owner in Bryan with 291 panels on his land, said he wanted to use solar to offset costs from what he’s using from the BTU power grid, with the upfront investment in the solar infrastructure.
“That’s a $230,000 investment, and if I had felt like there was a chance that the agreement wouldn’t have been upheld, I would not have made it,” Atkinson said.
Resident John Weir said the council should grandfather in existing systems because of the initial investment people made with the different agreements.
“This is a class of people who feel they’re being materially harmed by this change,” he said. “It seems to me to be a clear violation of the contracts we signed with you.”
Diving in deeper
The council had a long, detailed discussion after the BTU presentation, with council member Marca Ewers-Shurtleff saying the amendment needed to go back to the drawing board because of potential contract violations.
“I’m trying to find some kind of balance in how we don’t cost-subsidize for one group of citizens off the backs of another,” she said. “How do we strike a balance?”
Council member James Edge said he agreed with Ewers-Shurtleff, questioning the city's and BTU’s legal right to make this change.
“I hear some things that concern me. We hear staff recognized all of a sudden that this issue was a problem, yet staff still proposed this policy,” Edge said. “It’s difficult for me to suggest that the people who had good faith in these units being installed are in a position of not being able to recoup.”
Mayor Bobby Gutierrez said his position was to represent the nearly 100,000 people of Bryan, and keeping a policy benefiting only 1% of that population would be unfair.
“I think BTU does a tremendous job, and that’s why they’re at the bottom 5% of rate payers in the country,” he said. “I hope you guys understand at BTU that all of this falls on us.”
Council member Jared Salvato asked Lyles about the cost of BTU solar and non-solar customers, also praising the new model BTU put forth.
“I think the model serves all BTU customers to make sure everyone’s getting a fair rate,” Salvato said. “This ordinance change checks all of those boxes.”
The impact
Ewers-Shurtleff proposed the ordinance possess language grandfathering in existing solar customers with the current contract, but it failed to advance. Salvato motioned to pass the current ordinance, which passed.
All current solar customers in Bryan have until August to sign the new agreement for the city to purchase surplus electricity generated by their panels. The city is offering a program where customers can still receive the benefits of the original agreement, all dependent upon when the panels were installed.
