Staff Report Item 8
Staff Report Item 8
To: Ava Community Energy Authority
From: Marie Fontenot, SVP of Power Resources
Subject: Updating the board on the status of Ava’s 2024 Integrated Resource Plan compliance filing, due to the California Public Utilities Commission in August, 2026.
Date: May 20, 2026
__________________________________________________________________ Summary/Recommendation
This staff report seeks to (1) provide an overview of deliverables Ava is required to submit no later than August 10, 2026 to comply with the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) proceeding; and (2) discuss preliminary results of Ava’s analysis and describe what additional information will be presented to the Board for approval prior to completion of the compliance filing. This item is informational and no action is required.
Financial Impact
N/A
Analysis and Context
All California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) jurisdtictional load serving entities, including Ava, are required to comply with regulatory requirements. One of the CPUC’s regulatory proceedings is the Integrated Resource Planning (IRP) Proceeding. The IRP has two distinct tracts: track 1, a bi-annual compliance analysis and filing; and track 2, procurement mandates and resource sufficiency demonstrations.
The 2026 bi-annual compliance analysis and filing must be submitted to the CPUC by August 10, 2026. Ava must perform a long-term resource planning analysis that looks out into the Staff Report Item 8
2040s and evaluates what resources are the best fit for Ava’s portfolio going into the future. The analysis will evaluate potential portfolio costs and how effectively the future, hypothetical portfolio will be able to reduce emissions.The analysis must comply with the CPUC’s prescriptive assumptions and incorporate Ava own assumptions of resource availability as well as internal requirements, like achieving an carbon-free portfolio as measured on a net annual basis by 2030.
Regulation requires that Ava obtain Board approval of the compliance analysis prior to filing it with the CPUC. Based on the current filing due date of August 10, 2026, staff will present the compliance analysis and filing materials to the Board for approval in the July Board meeting.
In today’s meeting, staff will present an overview of what will be filed in August as well as some preliminary analytical results to demonstrate the type of information that will be presented for the Board’s approval prior to filing. The preliminary results are not an accurate numerical or value respresentation of what will be included for filing in August. Staff also attaches to this report copies of the previous IRP compliance filing materials, completed in 2022, to help the Board familiarize itself with the required format of the materials.
In addition to the CPUC-mandate analysis and compliance filing, Ava staff will perform additional analyses using modified assumptions. Staff will present the additional analyses to the Board in the future; these analyses will provide explanations of wht Ava’s forecasted demand growth is, the costs of different possible resource portfolios, and the effectiveness of those resource portfolios in reducing Ava’s contribution to grid emissions over time. These long-ter, planning analyses inform what resources Ava contracts wit over time but do not explicitly guarantee that Ava will contract with certain resource types or volumes from any resource type as the assumptions of resource cost and availability that are made when performing the analysis do not perfectly correlate to market conditions wen contracting occurs.
Attachments
A. Staff Presentation
B. 2022 IRP Narrative Document in required format
C. 2022 IRP Resource Data Template in required excel format D. 2022 IRP Clean System Power Calculator in required excel format Integrated Resource
Planning - 2026
Marie Fontenot | May 20, 2026
Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Agenda
2 • Overview of IRP
• Timeline
• Submission
• Required Materials for Submission
• CPUC Required Inputs
• Description of Model Assumptions
• Discussion of Preliminary Results
Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Overview of Integrated Resource Planning
• The California Public Utility Commission's (CPUC) Integrated Resource Planning (IRP) program is a long-term planning process to ensure enough generation capacity is built to:
1. Reliability meet customer demand
2. Meet greenhouse gas reduction targets
• CPUC staff use capacity expansion modeling to determine the optimal mix of resources needed to meet requirements 1 and 2
• To inform their modeling, the CPUC requires Load Serving Entities (LSEs) to submit our own IRP portfolios identifying least-cost, GHG-compliant resource mix to meet our customer demand • Ava's IRP Portfolio submission is both a compliance requirement and an opportunity to express our procurement preferences
3 Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Timeline & Process
4 Date Event
Oct 28, 2025 Scoping Memo establishing 2026 IRP Schedule Jan 16, 2025 Filing requirements published via ALJ ruling August 10, 2026 IRP filing deadline to CPUC
~Q3 & Q4 2026 CPUC staff aggregate LSE IRPs, prepare proposed PSP portfolio ~Q1 or Q2 2027 ALJ ruling seeking comments on proposed PSP ~Q2 or Q3 2027 Proposed decision addressing LSE IRPs and adopting PSP ~Q3 2027 Final decision addressing LSE IRPs and PSP
Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Submission of Ava's IRP
5 • Every two years, Ava is required to submit an IRP that meets CPUC-determined reliability and decarbonization metrics
• Specifically, Ava must submit:
▪ Resource Data Template (RDT): Summary of current and planned procurement ▪ Clean System Power (CSP) Calculator: Evaluation of portfolio emissions ▪ Narrative Template: Description of portfolio and modeling process • GenX modeling informs, but does not directly translate into, these deliverables Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
The Filing – Required Materials
6 Narrative Template
▪ Executive Summary
▪ Study Design
▪ Study Results
▪ Action Plan
▪ Lessons Learned
▪ Note: each section
has required, defined
subsections
▪ Ava’s 2022 IRP
Narrative Template:
https://res.cloudinary.com/diactiwk7/im
age/upload/v1667342459/2022_IRP_EB
CE_LSE_Plan_xj6yzo.pdf
Resource Data Template
▪ Excel workbook; many, many
tabs
▪ Contract list w/ details
▪ Confirm contracts /
resources are assumed to
have “right’ capacity factors
based on when they come
online & other details
▪ Summarize capacity value of
resource
▪ Summarize types of
resources in portfolio
▪ Ava’s 2022 IRP RDT for 25
MMT portfolio:
https://cdn.sanity.io/files/pc49kbjr/produ
ction/b06053ae09b11af066a291fa70d00d
9653186e0b.xlsm
Ava’s 2018, 2020, 2022 IRPs can be found online at: https://avaenergy.org/about-ava/key-documents/integrated-resource-plan/ CSP Calculator
▪ Tool to estimate GHG &
criteria pollutant emissions
in portfolios
▪ Requirement to use this tool
& method for emission
accounting in IRP filing
▪ Only relevant to forecasting
emissions, not calculating
actual emissions
▪ Excel workbook; many, many
tabs
▪ Ava’s 2022 IRP CSP for 25
MMT portfolio:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Dib2bFk5
wLpibytxlLyxFxSjLM4Kr2qp/view?usp=sha
re_link
Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
CPUC Requirements
7 Required Inputs
• Load forecast & GHG benchmark for each LSE
• CAISO zonal topology
• Resource regions align with CAISO study areas
• Rules on candidate resources; i.e. x much natural gas for whole system, x much geothermal, x much in-state wind, x much out-of-state wind, etc) ▪ Includes rules for different resource capacity factors ▪ Resource cost assumptions
▪ Restrictions on how much of a resource type can be developed in different areas
▪ Resource generation profiles
• Planning reserve margin and resource capacity factors (effective load carrying capability ELCC)
• 2024 dollar year
Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Preliminary Model Assumptions
8 Category Constraint
Maximum Annual Build Capacity 500 MW
Maximum Market Purchase 1000 MWh
Maximum Market Sale 1000 MWh
Maximum out of state wind
capacity
200 MW per year, 800 MW across
all years
PCIA Hedge Incorporated as market purchase
Minimum Annual Build Capacity N/A
Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Preliminary Model Assumptions
9 Retail Demand: Applied historical load data shape to 2025 IERP Planning Forecasted Demand Year Retail Demand
(MWh)
2026 8,990,567
2028 10,085,167
2030 11,544,908
2035 15,806,806
2040 17,863,484
2045 19,300,035
Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Current Model Assumptions
10 Peak Demand Forecast: CPUC input, Ava 2026 Filing Requirement Data Year Annual Peak
Demand (MW)
PRM (%) PRM Demand
(MW)
Reliability
Demand (MW)
2026 1954.5 18% 2306.3 2382
2028 2415.9 19% 2874.9 2463
2030 2497.6 21% 3022.1 2062
2035 3021.9 23% 3717.0 2419
2040 3260.3 23% 4010.1 2744
2045 3532.0 23% 4344.4 2944
Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Preliminary “Results”
11 • Graphs represent the type of images and analytical findings that will be shared when IRP modeling is complete.
• Values in these images are not representative of final results. • “A model is only as good as its assumptions”
▪ To-be finalized assumptions: annual capacity “build” limitations, resource-specific annual capacity limitations, any resource types to “force” offtake from Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Total Capacity Results
(With 500 MW/year build constraint)
12 Annual Portfolio Capacity
Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Total Capacity Results (If no capacity constraint)
13 Annual Portfolio Capacity (If no capacity constraint on total new build) Note: lack of new-build constraint results in significantly more geothermal added to portfolio Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Incremental Capacity Results
(If no capacity build constraint)
14 Annual Incremental Capacity (New Build only, no build constraint) Note: lack of new-build constraint results in significantly more geothermal added to portfolio in early years
Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Hourly Resource Results
15 Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Hourly Resource Results
16 If no new build capacity constraint:
Attachment Staff Report Item 8A
Additional Elements of Compliance Filing
17 • Estimated cost & revenues of portfolio
• Estimation of Ava’s compliance portfolio emissions and portfolio contribution to state-wide emissions
• Estimation of annual generation from Ava’s compliance portfolio and value/ability of portfolio to contribute to hedging
• Portfolio contribution to system reliability
• CAISO market exposure associated with the portfolio
• Ability of portfolio to meet RPS compliance obligations Attachment Staff Report Item 8A