In 2001Enron was one of the largest suppliers of electricity for the west coast for Its electric energy needs due to a California bill 1890 that allowed Utilities to separate energy production and grids and transmission lines to create more value for the companies. In 2001 this created a disaster for so many people and companies because of the instability of rolling blackouts. It was later discovered that the shortage in electricity was manufactured by Enron to maximize profits.
Nevada state legislature saw Nevadas economic life blood could be affected if there wasn't an alternative sources of energy. Nevada was seeing a explosion in population growth to good jobs and economic stability. In 2004 Nevada legislation enacted AB 431 which first started a program for residential solar panels. This program was never implemented because it would set the counties to collect assessed solar tax over 20 years to pay for the panels.
in 2007 the Nevada legislature amended the law to provide incentives to encourage the investment to install residential solar panels. The incentives set the size of each residential capacity to produce electricity up to 1MW and could not produce more than 90% of the home energy needs. It put a cap of 3% of the then current state residential energy needs. It also established the rules and prices for purchases of excess electricity generated by the residential solar panels.
it wasn't until 2010 that residential solar panels were feasible for most consumers because even with Nevada and Federal rebates it would costly financial outlay. A new business model appeared in Nevada with Residential Solar Panel leases. This allowed a home owner to reduce there electric bill approximately 20% and have the maintainence done by the lessor with little or no upfront costs to the homeowner. Large Solar installation companies came into Nevada as this made economical sense to the Nevada residential consumer.
In 2013 Nevada Power was bought by Warren Buffet and he expressed his continued support for renewable energy. In early part of 2015 it became aware that the residential cap would be breached in a very short time. Nevada legislature was heavly lobbied by NVPOWER to not increase the caps. So they Nevada legislature did nothing and stated they would leave this up to the PUC. The PUC 3 members are all appointed by the governor and the chairman of the PUC name is David Noble who is also reported to be against solar panels and is only supportive of geothermal production.
The PUC Not only just rejected the cap increase they also enacted a new rate structure for net metering by slashing over five years the price paid for excess power generated. They also implemented a 15 minute demand fee during peak time. New a grid use rate that increases over 5 years as well. Surprising everyone the 17,000 existing solar residential users weren't even grandfathered as is normal when changes take place. None of these changes PUC enacted were proposed by NVPower. While the 17,000 solar users had entered a agreement with the solar companies they also had to sign contract with NVPower and has been made null and void by the PUC.
Nevada has on average 289 sunny days that is ideal for renewable energy production. The Solar industries had employed 6,000 highly skilled well paid jobs. The Solary companies spent millions in infrastructure, warehousing training and 3 appointed PUC members has gone above and beyond to destroy a Industry that would have help diversify Nevada economics and tax base.