If you think H.B. 201 is confusing, you’re not alone. This convoluted bill seeks to add unnecessary regulatory barriers to clean energy, while making broad assumptions about energy resource planning that don’t actually match with real world practice. For a state that ardently professes free market, limited regulatory values, it's a strange choice to directly interfere with industry standard energy pricing practices. And, its suspicious that they are only targeting clean energy.
What we are left to conclude is that the intent of the bill is to saddle clean energy with higher costs, in order to help prop up coal, which has for a number of years been the most expensive resource on the grid.
We’ll give you an example. The bill proposes to assign transmission costs to “variable energy resources that necessitate” their use. This is a fundamental misunderstanding of how our energy grid is built and utilized. Transmission is a multi-year, hugely expensive endeavor. It is not built to benefit a single resource, but rather to serve the entirety of the grid for many, many years. This proposal is akin to assigning all new and future road construction only to new and future car owners, instead of sharing the cost across all drivers. It doesn’t make sense, and regulators will be left without any real model or method for assigning costs, because the rationale is not based on utility best practice.
Utility planning is already a complex issue, and this bill invents unnecessary new regulatory definitions and practices that our utility lawyer calls “circular and confusing.” And while the new regulatory burden placed on clean energy may be arbitrary, the impact will be severe. Utahns will lose access to the most affordable and abundant energy resource in the state, resulting in higher bills, fewer jobs, and dirtier air.
The Utah Legislature passed H.B. 201 on Feb. 20, 2025. Take action now - tell Gov. Cox to to protect our access to clean, affordable energy and veto H.B. 201.
