Approved Minutes — original pdf

Approved Minutes

Page 1 of 2 The Austin Generation Resource Planning Task Force (‘the Task Force’) convened in a meeting at Austin City Hall, Room 1029, 301 West Second Street, Austin, Texas. CALL TO ORDER – CALL TO ORDER – Michael Osborne called the meeting to order at 2:33 p.m. Task Force members in attendance: Carol Biedrzycki, Clay Butler, Barry Dreyling, Grace Hsieh, Michael Osborne, Tom “Smitty” Smith and Michele Van Hyfte. Cyrus Reed and Mike Sloan were absent. APPROVAL OF MINUTES 1. The motion to approve minutes of the June 11, 2014 meeting, by Ms. Biedrzycki and seconded by Mr. Dreyling, passed on a vote of 7-0. CITIZEN COMMUNICATION: GENERAL The following persons addressed the Task Force: Mark Kapner – the current rate structure affects commercial customers’ ability to add solar because there was an uncertainty on when demand charges would occur; he suggested that the group recommend that AE tweak the rate structure to allow customers the option of having their demand be calculated during the system peak between 4:00-6:00 p.m. Paul Robbins – criticized information “going around” about how San Antonio is a model for low-income programs; he said that AE’s demand side programs save 74% more energy than San Antonio’s programs and cautioned against comparisons of the two utilities. Ross Smith – supports building another solar project like Webberville on closed landfills. David Dixon – urged shifting the focus to renewables including the LSAC recommendation of 400 MW of solar and energy storage projects. BRIEFINGS 2. Presentation from Austin Energy depicting AE generation and AE load on a diurnal basis for the past 24 months in graphic form by Sathibabu “Babu” Chakka, Manager, Energy Market Analysis. OLD BUSINESS 3. Review of presentation by Austin Energy of wholesale real time market purchases since the adoption of the nodal market broken down by months. Market purchases related to unplanned outages of Austin Energy generation resources should be separated out and tied to the particular resource which was down – No discussion. 4. Review of Presentation by Austin Energy of present and future costs associated with each generation resource to include “all in” production cost broken down on a dollar per watt basis that shall incorporate all costs associated with that resource – No discussion. 5. Discussion of Austin energy resources and peak demand and demand side resources – No discussion. 6. Discussion regarding generation plan scenarios – Members acknowledged receipt of Mr. Reed’s “memo from the beach” in which he listed two scenarios he was interested in having the utility run. Mr. Osborne said he did not support having additional scenarios run. Ms. Van Hyfte said there seemed little point to doing so since the scenarios would be available after their report was complete. 7. Discussion of Competitive Issues and other obstacles to the Task Force – No discussion. 8. Discussion of Report Format and timing – Mr. Osborne displayed for the group’s review a draft of Austin Generation Resource Planning Task Force Meeting Minutes June 18, 2014  Page 2 of 2 the report format and content. Additional assignments were made to provide content for the report. Mr. Dreyling asked how the group would approve it, whether it would be all or nothing. Mr. Osborne said everything should be included. 9. Discussion on Report outline – See #8. 10. Discussion and possible action on Report Recommendations – Mr. Osborne suggested the Task Force vote on recommendations at the meeting next week (June 23). FUTURE AGENDA ITEMS Discussion regarding future agenda items, including a schedule of topics, and issues raised during briefings and Citizen Communications during this meeting – Mr. Osborne asked staff to schedule two additional meetings on July 2 and July 9 in order for the group to finalize work. Mr. Smith said he was uncomfortable making final recommendations without public input. Mr. Osborne said they would receive public input when they presented their report at the Electric Utility Commission meeting on July 21. Ms. Van Hyfte said she would reach out to CCARE for their comments. ADJOURNMENT - Mr. Osborne adjourned the meeting at 4:00 p.m. without objection.