Georgetown Consulting Group Inc. said the first step in the process is the establishment of renewable energy potential, which is “expected to be undertaken shortly.”
“With the reestablishment of the steering committee for the ad-hoc NMI interagency energy task force…more momentum is expected in the area of renewable energy,” Georgetown said.
Georgetown said it is expected that the Commonwealth Public Utilities Corp. will be invited to participate.
“[Federal] funding not only for baseline assessments, but for the efforts necessary to establish [Renewable Portfolio Standard, or] RPS policy benchmarks could be a possibility,” Georgetown said.
Public Law 15-87 requires CUC to establish 100 percent RPS before Dec. 31, 2014 and CPUC to conduct an RPS study.
CPUC, the consultant said, is to assess whether the RPS can be met cost-effectively and, if not, how the standards set by law should be reset.
Georgetown said until the baseline work is completed by Interior and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, and more work is done on cost-effectiveness, “it is not possible to determine a policy for the potential role and level of renewable energy that could be deployed in the CNMI.”
However, once the baseline work on the potential and cost-effectiveness is performed it would be possible for CPUC to identify incentives and performance-based rates to encourage renewable energy resources, Georgetown said.
