Michigan Regulator Seeks to Update Utility Resource Planning to Reflect New Carbon-Neutrality Goal

The Michigan Public Service Commission on Sept. 24 requested staff and stakeholders in its MI Power Grid initiative to recommend how utility resource planning requirements should be revised to reflect the new emissions reductions goals set by an executive order from Governor Gretchen Whitmer.  The order, issued on Sept. 23, creates the MI Healthy Climate Plan, which puts the state on a path towards carbon-neutrality by 2050. MI Power Grid is a multi-year stakeholder initiative aimed to maximize the benefits of the shift to clean and distributed energy resources.

The executive order formally sets the goal of economic decarbonization by 2050, and provides that the state will aim to achieve a 28 percent emissions reduction relative to 1990 levels by 2025. The Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy, under the Office of Climate and Energy, is tasked with implementing the MI Healthy Climate Plan, which will serve as Michigan’s action plan for cutting emissions and moving towards economy-wide carbon neutrality. Further, the Department of Technology, Management, and Budget is required to take measures to boost energy efficiency in new state buildings and facilities. The directive creates the Council on Climate Solutions to recommend opportunities to implement emissions-reduction strategies ensuring solutions are in place for communities that are disproportionately impacted by the climate crisis.

Launched in October 2019, MI Power Grid was spurred by transformational changes in the power sector, with about half of the state’s coal-fired generation expected to close by 2025, and more retirements planned thereafter. The initiative’s three areas of emphasis are expanding customer engagement, integrating relevant technologies, and optimizing grid performance.

Public Service Commission Chair Dan Scripps challenged the MI Power Grid workgroup on integrated resource, distribution, and transmission planning to suggest changes to long-term resource planning parameters so that the MI Healthy Climate Plan’s targets can be considered in utilities integrated resource plans, or IRPs. The next IRPs of the state’s utilities, Consumers Energy Co., Upper Michigan Energy Resources Corp. and Indiana Michigan Power Co. are due in 2021, before the update occurs. Scripps asked staff to develop recommendations that the utilities can best incorporate in their emission reduction targets.

Recommendations on revising the IRP filing requirements are anticipated in mid-December.