Clean Power Plan Reports and Outreach for National Association of State Utility Consumer Advocates

National Association of State Utility Consumer Advocates
Project completed August 2015

Synapse supported the National Association of State Utility Consumer Advocates and its members in addressing the EPA’s proposed Clean Power Plan in a manner that is cost-effective and efficient from an electricity consumer perspective.

Prior to the release of the rule, Synapse presented to NASUCA members key issues regarding the details of the proposed rule and the primary compliance options that may be available to states. Following the rule’s release, Synapse prepared a report focusing on the details of the rule as proposed. Recognizing that stakeholders have a wide range of reactions to the EPA’s Plan, the intent of the report is to be a common resource to help all of NASUCA’s members think through a broad range of potential implications of various compliance approaches to their respective consumers—whatever their individual state’s positions. Synapse presented on the findings of Implications of EPA’s Proposed “Clean Power Plan” at the 2014 NASUCA annual meeting in San Francisco, CA.

Synapse used its Clean Power Plan Planning Tool (CP3T) to perform multi-state analysis of the proposed rule to identify and explain a variety of challenges and opportunities related to multi-state compliance, including how states with dissimilar renewable technical potential, states with utilities that cross state boundaries, states with existing mechanisms for cooperation, etc., may approach regional compliance with the Clean Power Plan. Pat Knight, the lead developer of CP3T, provided a webinar for NASUCA members giving an overview of key issues surrounding the Clean Power Plan, as well as a walkthrough of CP3T’s multi-state functionality. Synapse also prepared a report presenting the results of the analysis, presented at the NASUCA 2015 Mid-Year Meeting.

As a third element of Synapse’s Clean Power Plan support to NASUCA members, Synapse prepared a report on best practices in planning for implementation of the Clean Power Plan. The report serves as a guide for consumer advocates to the logistics of developing a state implementation plan, with advice in areas such as stakeholder engagement, evaluating resource options, deciding on reasonable assumptions, identifying appropriate modeling tools, and selecting and implementing a plan.

This work was made possible by a grant from The Energy Foundation.