Energy.

Senators Becker and Wahab and Assembly Member Petrie-Norris unveil a sweeping package that fuses energy infrastructure finance with wildfire safety and climate resilience, establishing a California Transmission Infrastructure Accelerator and a dedicated revolving fund to mobilize private capital for eligible transmission projects while anchoring the effort in state oversight and ratepayer protection. The measure envisions moving a broader share of project financing through a state-backed framework, treating accelerator finance as a public-interest activity and expanding the California Infrastructure and Economic Development Bank’s toolkit to support energy projects alongside traditional public facilities.

A centerpiece is the Transmission Infrastructure Accelerator and its revolving fund, designed to finance eligible transmission projects through direct lending or participation with other lenders, with guidelines prepared and approved by the bank board. The accelerator is required to coordinate with the Independent System Operator’s planning process, evaluate results, and select projects for potential public financing within a defined window after ISO planning releases. Eligible projects must meet criteria such as interconnection points within the ISO balancing authority, prior track records on transmission projects in the state, and alignment with cost-savings goals that may be realized by reducing debt or improving capital efficiency. The bill also directs the Energy Unit to create the accelerator’s financing strategy and to pursue public-private partnerships that maximize debt financing while seeking ratepayer savings.

The proposal adds a new and relatively broad tax credit to support eligible transmission investments, offering qualified taxpayers a credit equal to a percentage of qualified expenditures—20 percent for eligible transmission projects, with a cap of 20 million dollars per taxpayer each year within a set window. Qualified expenditures cover planning, design, engineering, permitting, construction, equipment, and related qualified wages. If a taxpayer claims the credit, the taxpayer is precluded from earning a return on equity for the portion of the project funded by the credit, and the state would inform the Franchise Tax Board of approved projects. The bill further stipulates that the credit program is exempt from the usual performance-indicator reporting requirements that accompany many tax expenditures.

In the realm of wildfire risk and resilience, the measure envisions a Continuation Account within the Wildfire Fund to separate and organize assets and revenues dedicated to ongoing claims and administration, with large electrical corporations contributing annual amounts and ratepayers possibly affected by a nonbypassable charge if a separate rulemaking process determines it is just and reasonable. The fund and account are designed to be durable tools for allocating resources to eligible claims and related costs, with provisions for bond issuance by the Department of Water Resources to support fund liquidity and for wind-downs should the fund be terminated. The plan also introduces a right-of-first-refusal mechanism for subrogation rights involving property insurers and large electrical corporations, aimed at giving the utility sector a first look at settlements before insurers proceed to other channels, under defined nondisclosure protections to safeguard sensitive information.

To bolster oversight and safety, the bill expands the Office of Energy Infrastructure Safety’s remit, emphasizes independent third-party auditing of energization and wildfire mitigation performance, and strengthens wildfire mitigation planning for both investor-owned and public utilities. It also accelerates and refines the wildfire mitigation planning process—requiring updated plans, public review, and a structured feedback loop—with provisions to simplify or tier environmental review where appropriate, while maintaining environmental protections. The act broadens plan-development requirements for undergrounding programs, introduces transparent public engagement, and requires ongoing reporting and monitoring by independent monitors, with penalties for noncompliance. Taken together, the measures place climate risks and reliability concerns at the center of California’s energy-finance architecture, seeking to stabilize long-term costs and ensure that transmission expansion proceeds with appropriate public and private incentives, oversight, and accountability.