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Net metering law signed for health, education
A net metering scheme for both the Commonwealth Healthcare Corp. and Public School System is now law.
Gov. Eloy S. Inos on Friday signed into law Senate Bill 18-67, which now becomes Public Law 18-75.
S.B. 18-67 was introduced by former senator Pete Reyes. The bill was passed by the Senate and the House of Representatives of the 18th Northern Marianas Commonwealth Legislature last December.
Net metering is a low-cost type of renewable energy technology that allows customers to bank their energy and use it at their convenience and then sell any excess power they produce to the Commonwealth Utilities Corp.
CHCC and PSS have been saddled with “exorbitant bills each month,” proponents of S.B. 18-67 said, and that “the Commonwealth government cannot afford to fully subsidize CHCC and the PSS in order to satisfy their monthly utility bills.”
Accordingly, the purpose of S.B. 18-67 is “to provide a definition for net metering and to prioritize the interconnection with net metering for health and education renewable energy capacity at CUC.”
CHCC and PSS can potentially save millions of dollars in utility costs through net metering.
CHCC for instance, is averaging $400,000 to $500,000 a month in utility costs. Utility cost is the second highest expenditure for the CHCC, reaching more than $6 million a year.
In an earlier report, PSS said its CUC bill in October reached $209,000. PSS had a usage of 436,000 kilowatt hours for total power expense of $190,000.
In November, total expenses went down slightly to $199,732. Consumption was at 434,000 kilowatt hours but expense was reduced because rates were going down.
In December, total expenses increased slightly to $201,795. About $136,663 of this was in total power cost, even as PSS usage jumped to 467, 000 kilowatt hours.
