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Senate Bill 398 |
Senate Author: Menéndez et al. |
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Effective: 9-1-21 |
House Sponsor: Deshotel |
Senate Bill 398 amends the Business & Commerce Code to establish certain disclosure requirements applicable to the sale or lease of distributed renewable generation resources.
Senate Bill 398 amends the Local Government Code to prohibit a municipality from prohibiting or restricting the installation of a solar energy device by a residential or small commercial customer, except to the extent to which a property owner's association may prohibit the installation or to which the interconnection guidelines and interconnection agreement of a municipally owned utility serving the customer's service area, the rules of the Public Utility Commission of Texas, or the protocols of ERCOT limit the installation of such devices due to reliability, power quality, or safety of the distribution system.
Senate Bill 398 amends the Utilities Code to provide for the interconnection and operation of certain distributed generation facilities installed on the customer's side of the meter but separately metered from the customer with a nameplate capacity of at least 250 kilowatts and not more than 10 megawatts for purposes of maintaining electric service to certain retail customers involved in the food supply chain during service interruptions, including an emergency declared by ERCOT. Among other provisions, the bill authorizes a person who owns or operates a qualifying distributed generation facility in an area of the ERCOT power region where retail customer choice has not been implemented that is served by a municipally owned utility or electric cooperative to sell electric power generated by the facility at wholesale, including the provision of ancillary services, and authorizes a person who owns or operates such a facility to otherwise sell electric power generated by the facility at wholesale to a municipally owned utility or electric cooperative certificated for retail service to the area where the facility is located or to a related generation and transmission electric cooperative.