BC Green Party and BC Conservatives criticize the end of BC Hydro’s net metering

B.C.'s two opposition parties are criticizing BC Hydro and the province regarding recent changes to the utility's net metering program that went into effect July 1. The post BC Green Party and BC Conservatives criticize the end of BC Hydro’s net metering appeared first on CHEK .

B.C.’s two opposition parties are criticizing BC Hydro and the province regarding recent changes to the utility’s net metering program that went into effect July 1. The BC Green Party says it’s bad timing and messaging while the BC Conservatives says changes like this will make people skeptical of incentive programs in the future. People like Denise Kinvig say they feel burned after the changes to the net metering program.

“Now instead of looking at my panels, instead of feeling happy I’m not. I just feel really robbed,” said Kinvig. Kinvig had 24 solar panels installed on her barn in Chemainus a year and a half ago through a BC Hydro incentive plan.

She received $5,000 towards the purchase and installation of the panels. While she knew changes were coming July 1, she didn’t expect BC Hydro to end its net metering plan, which credits each kilowatt hour produced with a kilowatt hour at a later time , usually in the colder months. “It gave no indication about the kinds of changes they had planned and they knew full well they had already applied at that point to BC Utilities

[BCUC] to make these changes and there was no transparency to the kind of change,” said Kinvig. “We would not have moved forward with this kind of investment had we known that.” The new self generation rate structure sees Hydro buy back excess electricity for 10 cents per kilowatt hour which is less than BC Hydro sells it back for.

Watch the full story in the video below: Loading the player... “With the changes it would’ve been better if we had just put the money into, in just a GIC we would’ve probably had a better pay back than what we’re now looking at.” Kinvig is among the small scale solar producers impacted by BC Hydro’s recent end of its net metering program. The BC Green Party calls the changes to the net metering plan unfortunate.

“Really bad timing. Really bad messaging for people who were considering investing in solar to generate their own electricity, to make a climate impact,” said Jeremy Valeriote, the Green MLA for West Vancouver – Sea to Sky. Valeriote says BC Hydro shouldn’t hold the price it pays for excess solar power at ten cents per kilowatt hour.

“Meanwhile the price that you pay to buy it back goes up with inflation or even more than inflation so it just makes that differential more and more over time and so that’s an added piece of discouragement that I don’t people should have to deal with,” said Valeriote. The BC Conservatives say the end of net metering will make a lot of people analyze BC Hydro incentive programs much closer. “Doing what they did July 1st really, really puts a lot of distrust in government and any kind of rebate program or any kind of clean energy policy they want to put forward.

People are going to be skeptical and it’s never good,” said David Williams, BC Conservatives critic of BC Hydro and Energy Development. The B.C. government declined an interview and deferred to BC Hydro. The utility maintains the net metering program was subsidizing solar producers.

“We wanted to make sure that the rates and the amount we charge for electricity and pay for electricity are fair to all our customers so we went through an exhaustive process and submitted our application to the BC Utilities Commission which agreed to the rate change,” said Ted Olynyk, BC Hydro’s community relations manager for Vancouver Island and the Sunshine Coast. When asked if the program was flawed to begin with Olynyk says no, not at all. “The fact that we had almost 20,000 customers participating in the program showed that it was a great opportunity for customers to try and manage their consumption and production of electricity to meet their needs.”

BC Hydro says it notified all customers of the coming rate changes and it wouldn’t make sense to buy electricity for more than it’s selling electricity. He also notes those who were grandfathered with net metering get continue on the program until 10 years is up and BC Hydro had proposed 20 years but the BC Utilities Commission nixed that idea. Kinvig still hopes the BC government, BC Hydro and the BC Utilities Commission will reconsider its changes.

BC Hydro says those who took the $5000 incentive have the option to pay that out in cash and remain in net metering for the 10 year period but says the math is very similar either way. The Solar Co-op Consortium have appealed to the BC Utilities Commission to review it’s calculations about the financial impacts of the changes. It has yet to receive a response.

The post BC Green Party and BC Conservatives criticize the end of BC Hydro’s net metering appeared first on CHEK .