05/18/2009 GAAS:247:09 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Print Version |
Recovery Task Force Issues Statement on Federal Decision to Equalize Smart Grid Investment
After Governor
Arnold Schwarzenegger urged the United States Department of Energy to change American Recovery and
Reinvestment Act (Recovery Act) guidelines to ensure balanced investment of
Smart Grid funding, the U.S. Department of Energy today released changed
guidelines reflecting many of the Governor's suggestions. Cynthia Bryant, head
of the California Recovery Task Force, issued the following statement:
"This decision
ensures that California gets a fair share of Recovery Act dollars by allowing
larger utilities, like those that are predominant in California and that affect
much of the rest of the country, to have access to Recovery Act funding
proportional to their size. This allows our state to better work toward
increasing our use of renewable energy and having a more efficient, flexible
power grid."
The original, low funding cap established through federal
guidelines dictated that a utility's project proposal could receive a maximum
grant of $20 million, meaning California's large and highly concentrated
utilities would have been limited to the same funding caps as smaller,
localized utilities in other states. The Governor urged the U.S. Department of
Energy to either increase the cap per project to $200 million, eliminate the
cap or base the cap on the size of the utility applying for the award.
Today the U.S. Department of Energy announced it is increasing the maximum
award available from $20 million to $200 million.
The Governor also urged an increase in the funding level for
the Smart Grid Demonstration solicitation, which was increased from $40 million
to $100 million under the federal government's revised guidelines.
