We believe in the clean energy future and we are leading by example, developing smart solutions to society’s climate and energy challenges.
The transportation sector is responsible for 36 percent of California’s GHG emissions, and nearly 50 percent if including emissions from fossil fuel refinement; it’s also the source of more than 80 percent of smog producing NOx and particulate emissions. One of the most promising opportunities to meet California’s complex environmental challenges and air quality standards is transportation electrification — powering passenger cars, delivery trucks, semi-trucks, and other vehicles with clean electric power instead of fossil fuels. In our service territory, many communities are disproportionately impacted by the pollution caused by transportation both to and from warehouses and factories along major freight corridors.
SCE's Transportation Electrification Plan, filed with the CPUC in early 2017, includes more than $570 million in programs and infrastructure to address major sources of greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution from heavy commercial and industrial vehicles. If enacted, the plan will benefit all SCE customers, especially those in impacted communities located along transportation corridors.
SCE is taking a leading role to ensure that transportation electrification plays a major part in reducing criteria pollutant emissions in California.
More than 28 percent of the electricity SCE provided customers in 2016 came from eligible renewable sources (as defined by the(California Energy Commission.)
That’s up from 24 percent in 2015. This increase was driven by:
• 49 percent increase in solar power
• 22 percent increase in wind power
SCE expects to derive 50 percent of its power from eligible renewable sources by 2030. The Renewables Portfolio Standard (RPS), which is set by the state, includes eligible renewable sources such as solar and wind energy that SCE produces or purchases. It excludes rooftop solar and large-scale hydropower in this definition. When all is included, SCE is currently at 40 percent clean power today.
California has made a major commitment to addressing climate change and our company will be a key player in this effort. Last year California passed SB 32, which aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2030. It demonstrates California’s willingness to lead in this effort, to demonstrate what can be done for other states and other governments across the world. In order to meet this ambitious mandate within a short 13 years, California will have to move much more aggressively than it has in the past — and sooner rather than later. Many of California’s policies have focused on electric power generation, but that represents only about 20 percent of current statewide greenhouse gas emissions. The largest source is the transportation sector (including petroleum refining), with about 50 percent of current emissions. Substantial new efforts will be needed across all sectors of the economy,and many of these efforts will require significant efficient electrification of sectors that today rely on fossil fuels and can instead rely on much cleaner power from the electric grid. We see the efficient electrification of transportation in California as a key component of carbon reduction. In January 2017, we filed our application at the California Public Utilities Commission laying out a path for using transportation electrification to help meet the state’s greenhouse gas reduction goals.
The race to lower emissions is embraced by our customers, who are adopting rooftop solar at a rate of 4,000 to 5,000 customers a month. Our role at Edison is to enable this shift with a strong grid that supports electric vehicles, customer-sited storage, rooftop solar, energy management systems, smart thermostats and all other technologies that allow customers to manage their electricity usage.