The Right to Self-Generate as a Grid-Connected Customer

I. INTRODUCTIONIn the early dawn of the evolution of our species a new and useful tool to provide us with an array of services was discovered-fire. Soon we learned to tame it and control it for our collective tribal purposes. Once a source of fire was found, someone would then transport the smoldering remnants of that original source to the tribal encampment. There, its energy would be used for multiple beneficial purposes including heating, light, cooking, defense from wild animals, and tool making. The tribe did not need or want the "fire" per se, but instead the services that it could provide.In order to oversee and maintain this community source of energy, the role of fire-keeper was created. This person or group was tasked with obtaining the means to create fire for the tribe near its home camp, and maintaining the fire once ignited at the community hearth. Fire-keepers were the central, reliable source of this critical element for the tribe's security and well-being.Gradually, methods were devised to create fire locally, without the need for transportation of coals or embers from long distances. Flint could be struck against iron to produce sparks, bow drills created friction and heat to ignite tinder, and once glass was produced, lenses could be used to focus the sun to start a fire. The wide availability of the skills and materials need to start a fire lessened the importance of the ancient role of fire-keeper.Finally, with the advent of the first self-igniting chemical match in 1805, the energy of fire could be easily available to anyone in their home or business, or wherever they chose. The ability and right to use this source of energy was no longer limited to those with the power to create it and distribute it.No one would suggest that an individual lacks the legal right to start and maintain a fire in their own house in a stove for cooking or in a fireplace for heating and aesthetic enjoyment. Further, it is commonly understood that property owners can use fire on their premises for any purpose that conforms to applicable laws, regulations, and codes regarding health and safety.Fire is one way to harness energy for useful purposes. Electricity is another. Unlike fire though, the harnessing and delivery of this useful societal tool eluded us until the mid-eighteenth century. It was then that the mechanism for electrical generation and the invention of end-use applications, such as electric lighting, were developed and commercialized. To economically generate, deliver, and use this new energy source, a system of centrally located electric generation stations was built, primarily fueled by coal or the current of rivers. Later, oil, gas, and nuclear fuel were added to the mix. From those central electric generating plants, transmission lines conducted power toward a place of demand where voltage was eventually stepped down again to the level used in our homes and businesses.Electricity, as commonly delivered today, could be considered analogous to the coals transported by our ancestors, from encampment to encampment, to provide energy to all members of the tribe. And there is still a "fire-keeper" for electricity-the retail distribution utility-charged with the responsibility to reliably protect the "fire source" and provide it to all members of the community. It delivers electricity to us, and owns and maintains the means to do so. The local electric distribution utility is typically given the governmental imprimatur of a "monopoly franchise." This exclusive right to a monopoly franchise or service territory carries with it an obligation to invest in and reliably provide electric service to all customers within the service territory. Unlike the case of the fire-keeper, these obligations on the part of the utility also include the right for the utility to charge and receive from its customers full compensation (expenses, including investment, plus a regulatory determined return or profit level) through a rate tariff or series of tariffs established and authorized by the state utility regulator. …