by Dana Gentry, Nevada Current

NV Energy is shrinking its carbon footprint and staying ahead of a state mandate to produce half of its electricity from renewable sources by 2030, the utility announced earlier this month in its annual report on efforts to comply with Nevada’s Renewable Portfolio Standard, a mandate not only codified in law but enshrined in the state constitution. 

NV Energy announced that 47% of the electricity it sold in 2024 was from renewable sources, far exceeding the required renewable portfolio standard (RPS) threshold of 34% for 2024, and just under the 50% goal set for 2030. 

“These renewable resources provide a fuel-free energy source reducing customer energy costs and also eliminate carbon emissions to help improve the environment,” says the company’s news release.  

But some critics complain consumers aren’t getting the full picture. They say NV Energy is relying on legislative loopholes baked into the equation –  renewable energy credits that boost the utility’s RPS results without the corresponding reduction in carbon emissions. The credits were designed to ease the transition of electric utilities from carbon-emitting fossil fuels to cleaner, greener energy sources. 

Absent the credits, NV Energy produced 29% of its electricity from renewable sources last year, which is below the mandated RPS of 34% for 2024. 

NV Energy did not respond to requests for comment.

Nevada Consumer Advocate Ernest Figueroa, in a 2023 filing with the Public Utilities Commission, alleged NV Energy is fudging the percentage of electricity sales it reports from renewable energy sources, and would not meet its requirement if not for accounting practices that are being phased out. 

“It is the statutory and regulatory loopholes in the accounting for Nevada PECs (Porfolio Enegy Credits) that allow the utilities to claim much higher percentages of PEC compliance,” the Consumer Advocate asserted in the filing.

“Like all other energy providers in the state, current Nevada law requires that energy providers report energy credits, not an energy standard, as part of the RPS,” a spokesperson for the utility said in 2023. 

In 2023, NV Energy executive Jimmy Daghlian told Clark County commissioners that hitting the 50% renewable threshold by 2030 “is going to be a challenge.”

“I’ll be honest,” said Daghlian, vice president of renewable energy, during an update on the utility’s efforts to transition away from fossil fuels..“We’re seeing a lot of the costs go up. Battery prices have doubled in the last two years. Solar panel prices have gone up 40 to 50%.”

“While NV Energy technically meets its renewable targets, the numbers are inflated by older credits and accounting tactics, not by delivering more real renewable energy to customers,” Nevada Conservation League Executive Director Kristee Watson said via email. “At the same time, NV Energy is doubling down on fossil fuels by building new gas plants, which undermines the cost savings, economic benefits, and public health improvements Nevadans should be seeing.”

Until last year, NV Energy was permitted to use energy efficiency savings, known as demand-side management, to comply with up to 10% of its annual Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS). As of this year, no credit for energy efficiency savings is allowed under state law. 

Three other credits remain available to NV Energy to demonstrate compliance with RPS mandates:

Behind-the-meter credits represent renewable energy created by customers, such as rooftop solar panels; Station Usage credits reflect the energy consumed in some operations of geothermal facilities; andThe solar multiplier, which credits NV Energy almost 2.5 hours of credit for each hour generated by a photovoltaic system installed before 2016. 

“The Rube Goldberg-esque models used to calculate credits depend significantly on purchased credits from other companies in the solar/geothermal business, many of which will be subsidized by the construction of the Greenlink project,” says Boulder City resident Fred Voltz, a close observer of the electric utility. Greenlink, which has ballooned in cost from just under $2.5 billion to more than $4.2 billion, is designed to transport renewable energy generated in remote areas of the state. 

Greenlink’s price tag is likely to increase even more, given President Donald Trump’s imposition of tariffs on products and materials from Mexico, Canada, China and other nations.

Obstacles on the path to a carbon-free future, according to Voltz, include the failure of battery storage technology to extend beyond four hours, and a water shortage that ensures “no new U.S. hydropower projects of any consequence” will be built in the foreseeable future. 

Less than a week before a massive blackout hit Spain and other European nations earlier this month, Spain’s electrical grid ran entirely on renewable energy for the first time on a weekday. 

The cause of the outage, which is still under investigation, may stem from a loss of power generation, likely from solar plants, resulting in instability in the system, experts say. 

“As we learn by events just how essential a steady electricity supply is to modern living, it is regrettable to see the risk taking engaged in by those relentlessly pushing for renewable energy without concern for its down sides,” says Voltz, adding the grid failure in Spain should give pause to renewable energy enthusiasts. “Neither the purchase of renewable credits nor the actual solar projects NVE spends ratepayers’ money on to satisfy the government-fabricated market for renewable energy will change the need for conventional generating capacity to keep the grid stable and energized when renewables are not producing energy.”

In Southern Nevada, where the sun shines an average of 294 days a year, and where until recently, the federal government subsidized the development of green energy, solar is the dominant player. Gemini, a contracted 690-megawatt solar facility with 380 megawatts of integrated battery storage, began operating in March of last year, NV Energy said in its news release on the RPS; Dry Lake Solar, a 150-megwatt facility with battery storage, opened a year ago; and NV Energy’s 400-megawatt Sierra Solar in Northern Nevada is expected to begin battery storage next summer, with solar service beginning in 2027.  

The global supply chain for solar largely originates in China. Tiny photovoltaic cells that are imported from China and crafted by American companies into solar panels, are now subject to tariffs totaling 84%, according to a trade publication. Chinese companies have moved operations to south-east Asian nations in an effort to minimize tariffs.

The Trump aministration’s Golden Era of Energy Development secretarial order from the Department of Energy seeks to “Advance energy addition, not subtraction,” a policy at odds with the 38 states that adopted renewable energy standards or goals. 

“Great attention has been paid to the pursuing (sic) of a net-zero carbon future,” says the order from Energy Secretary Chris Wright. “Net-zero policies raise energy costs for American families and businesses, threaten the reliability of our energy system, and undermine our energy and national security. They have also achieved precious little in reducing global greenhouse gas emissions.”

The Trump administration is seeking to limit the ability of states “to adopt climate mitigation strategies (including cap and trade and renewable portfolio standards) and by taking new authority to permit development of reserves of fossil fuels and other minerals critical to the energy space,” says an article from the National Law Review, adding the actions “portend radical changes to the balance between state and federal energy regulation if carried through.” 

“If they can withhold congressionally appropriated research funds for universities because they don’t like their policies with regard to free speech on their campuses, what else might they do?” San Francisco attorney Nico van Aelstyn wondered in a recent interview. “Withhold Medicaid funding to states where they don’t like their renewable energy standards?”

Nevada Current is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Nevada Current maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Hugh Jackson for questions: [email protected].