Solar Choice program costs

In the Solar Choice program, you will be charged for the solar power you are purchasing and related program charges. In return, you will receive a credit for the standard generation you are no longer purchasing. Read on for a more detailed description of our bill charges and credits:

The Solar Charge is the cost of the renewable solar power. This is calculated as the weighted average cost of the resources serving the program.

The Program Charge is set to fund the program’s marketing and administration costs, provide a credit for the positive value that solar provides to the grid, as well as cover additional energy-related costs to ensure that non-participating customers do not fund the program.

Those additional costs include:

• Costs associated with integrating the new renewable resources with the grid (Renewables Integration Charge). No value has yet been approved by the CPUC for this.
• State-level grid-management costs (California Independent System Operator, CAISO).
• Costs for registering, tracking and retiring Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) in the Western Renewable Energy Generation Information System (WREGIS).
• Resource Adequacy (RA) costs to ensure that there are sufficient generating resources available for anticipated load, locally and on a system basis.
• A credit for the positive value that solar provides in delivering energy to the grid during peak hours (Solar Value Adjustment).
• Program marketing and administration costs.

The Power Charge Indifference Adjustment (PCIA) is a CPUC-approved figure that ensures stranded generation costs are not shifted to non-participating customers when you switch to PG&E's Solar Choice program. The PCIA value differs by vintage year. Vintage year is based on the date that you begin service on PG&E's Solar Choice program. If you begin service in the first six months of the calendar year (e.g., 2017), you are assigned the prior year's vintage (i.e., 2016). If you begin service on or after July 1, you are assigned the vintage for the current year (2017 in this example). For reference, review the historical values (PDF, 92KB).

The Generation Credit is a credit equal to the average generation rate for your customer class. This credit is to recognize that your renewable energy purchase displaces the charges for the generation portfolio associated with your base rate.

Learn more about the various components described above: review our Historical Rates (PDF, 92KB) or check out the program's Price, Terms and Conditions (PDF, 245 KB).

Review potential future changes to the credits and charges in our community renewable rates.

DISCLAIMER: This CPUC-approved forecast may result in inaccurate results.

The 20-year forecast of credits and charges shown here are based on a prescribed forecast methodology ordered by the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) for use by the state’s three large investor-owned utilities and is based on a combination of a rolling five-year escalation rate and an escalation rate using a Consumer Price Index (CPI).* The forecasts are provided to illustrate potential future changes to the credits and charges to help you evaluate your intended participation in PG&E’s Solar Choice or Regional Renewable Choice program. As the CPUC acknowledged in D.16-05-006 (PDF, 588 KB), an estimate of GTSR credits and charges for 20 years (or even 5 to 10 years) is challenging and unlikely to be accurate. Moreover, the 20-year forecasts shown here are not necessarily representative of PG&E-specific forecasts of rate components. PG&E can neither predict nor guarantee any actual cost savings or increases due to changes to these credits and charges, and such changes will affect actual costs. Please contact PG&E for more information about this forecast.

* Specifically, a rolling five year rate escalation was applied to the GTSR component rates that had historical values and the CPI index was applied to GTSR component rates where no historical information was available.