In order for Con Ed to get into the sustainable energy business, as Gupta recommends, performance incentives must be introduced so that the utility is actually rewarded for helping independent generators, and for actively encouraging individual customers to cut down on consumption. To fully understand what a tall – and counterintuitive – order that is, though, you have to remember that Con Ed is a publicly traded corporation that gets paid like any other to move its product. Getting Con Ed into the green energy business will be an experiment in reverse capitalism. Government will have to enable Con Ed to generate revenue by figuring out ways to move less and less of its commodity.
If regulators succeed, said Lutzy, you may be seeing a whole lot more of those Con Ed-sponsored subway posters and television commercials advertising energy-efficient appliances and compact fluorescent lightbulbs. In effect, they will read: don’t buy our product.
Both Gupta and Lutzy were optimistic that an arrangement of some kind will be agreed upon by the end of the review process next spring. And yet not even that will be enough to reach the mayor’s sustainability objectives. Most important of all, it turns out, is upgrading the city’s electrical infrastructure, which means raising even more revenue.
The NRDC, a longtime advocate for these changes, said it doesn’t expect the rate increase to be as high as 17 percent, but it readily acknowledges the need for an increase of some kind. The city’s electrical grid, though advanced in some ways, presents special problems for net metering, and Con Ed is so worried about electrical disruptions that it requires independent generators to run far below capacity. The New York City Economic Development Corporation, which represents the city in negotiations concerning utility rates, confirmed the need for a rate increase, saying only that it wants to make sure the extra money is spent in ways that further the mayor’s sustainability goals.
Could it mean net metering for the city’s solar energy pioneers? Cheaper stand-by fees? Reduced administration costs?
A recent CUNY study claims that in the near future, solar energy could support as much as 18 percent of the city’s peak electrical load. Are we going to start seeing solar panels on every bit of rooftop in Manhattan and the outer boroughs?
The NRDC's Gupta thinks so. But the upshot of it all may be surprising: It’s not the energy giant or the independent generator but the average Con Ed customer who will be called on to bear much of the responsibility. By next April, you’re either going to have to pay a whole lot more on your monthly electric bill, or cut down dramatically on the energy you use. "Rates may be going up," Gupta said, "but if people are more efficient in the way they use energy, their monthly electric bill can still go down. We want people to shift their focus from rates to bills.”
