Establishes an integrated energy system plan that coordinates and optimizes the energy needs of combination corporation customers between electric supply, electric transmission, electric distribution, distributed energy, and demand-side resources and gas transmission and distribution to provide reliable, resilient, clean energy to combination corporation customers at the lowest reasonable cost and risk; defines terms; makes related provisions.
STATE OF NEW YORK
________________________________________________________________________
5995
2025-2026 Regular Sessions
IN SENATE
March 4, 2025
___________
Introduced by Sen. COMRIE -- read twice and ordered printed, and when
printed to be committed to the Committee on Energy and Telecommuni-
cations
AN ACT to amend the public service law, in relation to creating an inte-
grated energy system planning
The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem-bly, do enact as follows:
1 Section 1. Legislative findings. 1. Energy market, resource, climate,
2 and technology trends, including the proliferation of distributed energy
3 resources, energy efficiency and load flexibility, transportation elec-
4 trification, heating electrification, and advanced transmission technol-
5 ogies are causing simultaneous impacts, and providing benefits, on both
6 the gas and electric systems across pipelines, generation, transmission,
7 and distribution. If planning processes do not evolve to accommodate
8 such interactions and the benefits of advanced energy technologies, New
9 York utilities may be at risk of overinvesting in infrastructure, and
10 ratepayers may be at risk of paying for unnecessary infrastructure.
11 2. Such integrated energy system planning shall include, but not be
12 limited to:
13 (a) maintaining affordability amid significant pressure to modernize
14 and replace aging infrastructure; enhancing reliability and resilience
15 to prepare for extreme weather; and achieving New York's clean energy
16 and climate-related goals. New York state needs to find new ways to
17 optimize its planning and investments, and identify the least-cost way
18 to serve customers when designing any given project;
19 (b) developing new process, forecasting, and modeling innovations in
20 utility planning to allow for optimization across gas resources, gas
21 transmission, gas distribution, electric generation, electric trans-
22 mission, electric distribution, and distributed energy resources; and
23 (c) capitalizing on such innovations and preventing unnecessary dupli-
24 cation of energy infrastructure. New York needs to consolidate its vari-
EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
[] is old law to be omitted.
LBD10558-01-5
S. 5995 2
1 ous siloed planning processes and align forecasts, assumptions,
2 programs, plans, and other initiatives across gas, generation, trans-
3 mission, distribution, and distributed resource plans.
4 § 2. The public service law is amended by adding a new section 66-x to
5 read as follows:
6 § 66-x. Integrated energy system planning. 1. For the purposes of
7 this section, the following terms shall have the following meanings:
8 (a) "Combination corporation" means an investor-owned public service
9 company that is both an electric corporation and a gas corporation that
10 serves more than one hundred thousand retail customers with either gas
11 or electric service, or both.
12 (b) "Grid flexibility" means the grid's ability to shift either demand
13 or supply to meet bulk power system and/or local distribution needs in
14 response to changing grid conditions and prices in order to integrate
15 increased renewable energy supply, improve reliability, lower energy
16 costs, and reduce environmental impacts by decreasing net system peak or
17 localized coincident or non-coincident distribution system peaks through
18 the use of grid flexible resources.
19 (c) "Grid flexible resources" means the distributed energy resources,
20 technologies, interventions, distribution system technologies, advanced
21 transmission technologies, or other technologies as determined by the
22 commission, that can be actively or passively leveraged to meet grid
23 flexibility goals, measured in megawatts that contribute to decreasing
24 net system peak or a localized coincident or non-coincident distribution
25 system peak.
26 (d) "Integrated energy system plan" means a plan that coordinates and
27 optimizes the energy needs of combination corporation customers between
28 electric supply, electric transmission, electric distribution, distrib-
29 uted energy, and demand-side resources and gas transmission and distrib-
30 ution to provide reliable, resilient, clean energy to combination corpo-
31 ration customers at the lowest reasonable cost and risk.
32 (e) "Integrated energy system planning" means the process by which a
33 combination corporation develops, and the commission reviews for
34 approval, the integrated energy system plan.
35 (f) "Gas-only corporation" means a natural gas corporation that does
36 not provide electric service to any of its customers.
37 (g) "Distributed energy resources" means any geographically dispersed
38 energy resource located on an electric system that offsets electrical
39 demand, individually or in aggregate, including small generation facili-
40 ties, energy storage devices, energy efficiency devices and wholistic
41 interventions, demand response or load flexibility measures, and other
42 technologies as determined by the commission.
43 (h) "Advanced transmission technology" means a technology that
44 increases the capacity, efficiency, or reliability of an existing or new
45 transmission facility including, but not limited to advanced conductors,
46 grid enhancing technologies, dynamic line rating, topology optimization,
47 advanced power flow controls, and energy storage as a transmission
48 resource.
49 (i) "Net system peak" means gross peak load on the independent system
50 operator's system minus wind and solar resource generation levels to
51 provide the variance between total demand and the amount of other
52 resources required when renewable resources may no longer be generating.
53 (j) "Total systems benefit" means benefits inclusive of, in dollars on
54 an annual basis, the lifecycle energy, ancillary services, generation
55 capacity, transmission and distribution capacity, and greenhouse gas
56 reduction benefits, based on the department of environmental conserva-
S. 5995 3
1 tion's value of carbon guidance, of distributed energy resources or load
2 management activities or interventions that quantify the avoided costs
3 accrued to both the electric and gas systems relative to the existing
4 conditions or a found baseline.
5 (k) "Low-to-moderate income customers" shall mean households with
6 annual incomes at or below eighty percent of the state median income.
7 (l) "Disadvantaged communities" means communities that bear burdens of
8 negative public health effects, environmental pollution, impacts of
9 climate change, and possess certain socioeconomic criteria, or comprise
10 high-concentrations of low- and moderate- income households, as identi-
11 fied pursuant to section 75-0111 of the environmental conservation law.
12 2. By December first, two thousand twenty-five, the commission shall
13 initiate a rulemaking proceeding to implement integrated energy system
14 planning requirements for gas and electric services for combination
15 corporations, identifying which existing proceedings are to be consol-
16 idated within this new process. At a minimum, this must include the
17 long-term gas plans, distributed system implementation plans, and coor-
18 dinated grid plans. The commission shall allow combination corporations
19 that file integrated energy system plans to satisfy existing filing
20 requirements, eliminating the need for separate plans, where appropri-
21 ate, so long as all commission requirements applicable to the consol-
22 idated proceedings are all individually and jointly met in the inte-
23 grated energy system plan. Where a combination corporation's electric
24 and gas service territory does not overlap, the commission shall deter-
25 mine documentation necessary to demonstrate good faith attempts at mean-
26 ingful coordination with the other relevant gas or electric corporations
27 in its service territory. Combination corporations that are not required
28 to file integrated energy plans are not otherwise relieved of commis-
29 sion-imposed requirements.
30 3. Beginning no later than July first, two thousand twenty-eight and
31 every three years thereafter, the commission shall require combination
32 corporations to file an integrated energy system plan demonstrating how
33 the combination corporations' investment plans in the ten years follow-
34 ing the filing are consistent with the requirements of this chapter and
35 any rules and guidance adopted by the commission, and which, without
36 limitation:
37 (a) Achieve the obligations of the combination corporation of all
38 plans consolidated into the integrated energy system plan;
39 (b) Assess and optimize an investment, program, and action plan across
40 the energy system for cost, operational efficiency, and greenhouse gas
41 reductions all commercially available supply- and demand-side resources
42 across the electric and gas systems, including a comparison of the bene-
43 fits and risks of purchasing electricity or gas, acquiring or building
44 new capacity or delivery resources, adopting technologies to make more
45 efficient use of existing infrastructure, and implementing conservation,
46 efficiency, load management customer programs to:
47 (i) achieve the lowest reasonable cost to ratepayers across both
48 systems;
49 (ii) mitigate stranded asset, fuel price volatility, reliability,
50 resilience, overinvestment, and underinvestment risks to ratepayers;
51 (iii) mitigate overgeneration or curtailment events; and
52 (iv) implement the state's greenhouse gas emissions reduction limits
53 in chapter one hundred six of the laws of two thousand nineteen;
54 (c) Provide a range of twenty-year gas and electric forecasts and
55 scenarios, considering the interactions between the forecasts, of
56 projected customer demand that takes into account econometric data and
S. 5995 4
1 addresses changes in the number, type, and efficiency of usage, includ-
2 ing a bottom-up forecast of distributed energy resources and building
3 and transportation electrification technologies that may be installed,
4 with an assessment of their effect on load and operations;
5 (d) Incorporate programs designed to achieve all available electric
6 energy efficiency, building envelope and shell efficiency, and electric
7 and gas demand flexibility technologies or interventions that are cost-
8 effective on a total system benefits basis as further defined by the
9 commission at the portfolio level after accounting for all non-rate
10 recoverable incentive programs, including any federal incentives;
11 (e) Assess the achievable potential for electric and building shell
12 energy efficiency and demand flexibility technologies or interventions
13 for the subsequent ten-year period to optimize system benefits. Such
14 assessment should include barriers, challenges, and gaps to deploy ener-
15 gy efficiency and demand flexibility technologies or interventions with-
16 in the population at large and specifically within vulnerable popu-
17 lations, and make recommendations for how to address those barriers,
18 challenges and gaps strategically, including a systematic technical
19 analysis of current demographic and geographic energy consumption
20 patterns to identify areas and programs with high potential to provide
21 system benefits and cost savings;
22 (f) Assess and pursue non-pipeline and non-wires alternatives, and
23 advanced transmission technologies, as alternatives to replacing,
24 expanding, or upgrading aging gas or electric infrastructure or capacity
25 in all instances where the non-pipeline, non-wires alternative, or
26 advanced transmission technology is lower cost, lower risk, or both;
27 (g) Achieve grid flexibility goals with grid flexibility resources
28 equal to or greater than twenty percent of net system peak electric
29 demand in addition to the net system peak reductions from any energy
30 storage targets by two thousand forty, unless the commission finds that
31 a higher target is cost-effective, and commission-set distribution
32 system grid flexibility goals. The commission may accept a lower level
33 of achievement if it determined that this requirement is neither techni-
34 cally nor commercially feasible during the applicable emissions
35 reduction period;
36 (h) Include programs targeted at low-to-moderate income customers and
37 disadvantaged communities, designed after conducting community engage-
38 ment and consultation with relevant community-based organizations.
39 Programs may include, but are not limited to, electric appliance and
40 efficiency rebates and incentives, bill assistance, distributed energy
41 resource incentives, customer education, and electrification-readiness
42 incentives; and
43 (i) Anything else deemed necessary by the commission.
44 4. In determining whether to approve, approve with conditions, or
45 reject the integrated energy system plan, the commission shall evaluate
46 whether the plan is in the public interest, meets greenhouse gas emis-
47 sions reduction goals such that the requirements of section 75-0107 of
48 the environmental conservation law would be met in both the gas and
49 electric sectors; maintains energy system reliability, including for
50 critical facilities; mitigates long-term costs and risks, and results in
51 reasonable bill impacts to customers.
52 5. To maximize transparency, the commission shall require a combina-
53 tion corporation to make the data input files for its integrated energy
54 system planning process available to stakeholders in a format that is
55 compatible with existing department data platforms, aggregated as neces-
56 sary to protect customer confidentiality.
S. 5995 5
1 6. To the extent that a combination corporation's electric and gas
2 service territories do not entirely overlap, the commission shall direct
3 corporations to collaborate to the extent possible with the other rele-
4 vant electric and gas corporations, as determined by the public service
5 commission, within its jurisdiction to produce a plan that complies with
6 commission requirements and include a narrative describing its efforts
7 in this regard.
8 7. Combination corporations may consult with entities that engage in
9 planning beyond their service territory, such as the New York independ-
10 ent system operator and the North American electric reliability corpo-
11 ration, to inform their plans, but are not required to include planning
12 beyond state jurisdiction in their integrated energy system plans. If
13 they do consult with such entities, they shall detail the nature of that
14 consultation, and the results thereof, in their integrated energy system
15 plan filing.
16 8. In each long-term gas plan filed with the commission, the commis-
17 sion shall require a gas-only corporation to detail how it is or is not
18 coordinating with entities providing electricity services to customers
19 within its service territory to develop mutual awareness and improved
20 planning efforts related to gas and electric load forecasting, non-pipe-
21 line solutions that impact the electric system, thermal energy networks'
22 impact on the electric system, and overall infrastructure optimization
23 as utilities plan to achieve the climate justice and emission reduction
24 mandates in chapter one hundred six of the laws of two thousand nine-
25 teen. Such plan shall include modeling of the relevant electric corpo-
26 ration's assumptions about electrification onto gas load forecasts with-
27 in various decarbonization scenarios. Such plan shall also include a
28 description of protocols and unresolved challenges regarding secure data
29 sharing between electric and gas utilities that protect customers but
30 facilitate a meaningful exchange of usable information, a discussion of
31 the benefits and barriers to shared networks, and an identification of
32 gaps in granular, hourly data collection that is necessary to convert
33 gas usage into anticipated electric usage.
34 § 3. This act shall take effect immediately.
