San Diego

Clean Energy Bill Pushes Calif. to be 100% Green Powered by 2045, How will San Diego Measure Up?

Today, 29.65 percent of California’s energy production is coming from renewables, per the California Energy Commission

San Diego electric companies are confident that the county will be able to meet Governor Jerry Brown's goal to move California towards 100 percent renewable electricity by 2045.

Local electric companies such as Baker Electric Home Energy and renewable energy groups like Cleantech San Diego said San Diego County will meet the standards outlined in the governor's recently signed Senate Bill 100.

"It’s not going to be easy to get there, but it’s certainly reasonable to expect that we can," said President of Baker Electric Home Energy, Mike Teresso.

SB 100 raises California’s already ambitious goals for producing electricity from wind, solar and other green sources. The aim is to ensure greenhouse gas emissions are low enough that they can be absorbed by the environment.

Today, 29.65 percent of California’s energy production is coming from renewables, according to the California Energy Commission.

The efforts have drawn criticism from business groups worried about rising electric bills and some environmentalists who say Brown is too cozy with oil and gas interests.

"As consumers and residential homeowners are being able to install solar on our roofs, the adoption of home batteries to store that production and electrification of the grid all means by 2045 we can certainly get there," said Teresso. 

North County electric company Baker Electric Home Energy said they are seeing the demand for more solar panel and smart home installations.

"Having solar on your roof and then adding a home battery to that system, you can produce all the energy you need during the day and at night you can discharge that from your battery and you personally can be running on 100 percent renewable energy today," said Teresso.

To reach these goals other efforts need to be made as well such as reducing our greenhouse gas emissions from transportation.

San Diego is one of the nation’s leading cities in adopting clean transportation because it has one of the nation’s highest electric vehicle drivers per capita, according to Cleantech San Diego. There are 26,498 electric vehicles in the county.

The new standards set in SB 100 hopes to get California to use 50 percent renewable energy by 2025 and 60 percent by 2030; then, 100 percent by 2045. 

It's merely a goal, with no mandate or penalty for falling short. 

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