The Nitty Gritty and the Grandiose: How and Why CCA Works in San Francisco

The main benefits of forming a CCA are local control over electricity resources, increased negotiating power that comes from "aggregating" or pooling our local purchasing power, and access to low cost capital for the development of future generation capacity. CCAs also empower local regions to develop their own generation resources, offer specific rate incentives to business, and implement aggressive conservation and efficiency programs.

San Francisco currently consumes between 650 MW and 850 MW at any time. San Francisco's CCA plan includes 360 MW of capacity and load reductions. This consists of:

• 107 MW of conservation and efficiency load reductions
• 150 MW wind farm outside the city
• 104 MW of distributed generation - including a minimum of 31 MW of solar photovoltaic installations.

San Francisco's CCA is uniquely designed to promote a massive investment in building a renewable energy infrastructure. The aggregation policy is designed to couple with the bond authority - specifically the Prop H Bonds passed by voters in 2001 - allowing governments to link aggregated procurement bids with requirements to build renewable energy generation and conservation projects at a significant scale.