Assembly Bill 2878 by Assembly Member Cecilia Aguiar-Curry (D-Winters) helps achieve the state’s forest health and wildfire risk reduction goals by increasing the productive use of forest waste through energy generation and wood products manufacturing. RCRC is co-sponsoring AB 2878 to reduce future emissions from wildfires and vegetation management, increase local energy reliability in forested areas, and improve the local economy in rural communities.
In light of the tremendous destruction wrought by recent catastrophic wildfires, California must increase the pace and scale of long-overdue forest health improvement and wildfire risk reduction projects. RCRC believes that it is vital to promote the productive use of biomass residuals resulting from forest health improvement and wildfire risk reduction projects, since traditional methods of disposal (open burning and natural decomposition) produce far greater emissions than would occur in a biomass facility.
Assembly Bill 2878 helps improve local energy resiliency and overall grid reliability by: 1) facilitating the use of forest biomass to support rural microgrids; 2) requiring utilities to upgrade infrastructure in forested regions to reduce wildfire risk and support integration of bioenergy; and 3) incentivizing interconnection of bioenergy projects.
Additionally, AB 2878 extends the Bioenergy Market Adjusting Tariff (BioMAT) program’s sunset date to 2030. The BioMAT program requires utilities to procure electricity from small bioenergy projects, including biomass facilities that use fuels from high hazard zones. Smaller BioMAT facilities can be strategically located close to the areas where the need for fuel reduction and forest health improvement is greatest – areas which often have lower electrical reliability than the rest of the grid. The program has no statutory end date; however, the CPUC is scheduled to sunset the program on December 31, 2025, regardless of whether the procurement requirements have been met. The rapidly approaching deadline could chill many of these smaller projects that are instrumental to the state’s forest health, climate change, and pollution reduction objectives.
Finally, AB 2878 requires incorporation of the California Forest Carbon Plan’s recommendations into the State’s AB 32 scoping plan, thereby ensuring that California minimizes and prevents future fire-related emissions at the same time it seeks to reduce anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions.
AB 2878 will be heard in the Assembly Natural Resources Committee on April 18th and then go to the Assembly Utilities and Energy Committee for consideration. RCRC’s letter is available here.
A template letter of support for counties to send to the author can be downloaded here.
For more information, please contact RCRC Policy Advocate, John Kennedy.