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In August 2015, the staff of the Public Utilities Commission calculated the fees—$88.2 million by MGM, $23.9 million by the Sands, $16.6 million by Wynn.

MGM and Wynn ponied up the money and went their way. The Sands decided to try to dump the fees on the public. That’s the first place rank-and-file NV Energy customers will pay more if Question 3 is approved.

Sands owner Sheldon Adelson was perfectly willing to stick the public with his debt. He launched an effort to file an initiative petition partially deregulating power in the state by requiring the Nevada Legislature to shut down the state’s electric utility monopoly and create a competitive market in which all comers can supply power.

While this was going on, another energy drama was running more or less concurrently.

In 2014, many Democrats, demoralized in the last years of the Obama administration, stayed home instead of voting. Republican gains were strong, and in Nevada, there was a Republican sweep—every state government office elected statewide went to the GOP and both houses of the legislature did, too—the first time since 1890 such a thing happened.

Among the fruits of Republican control of the 2015 legislature was enactment of Senate Bill 374, calling on the Public Utilities Commission to conduct “an analysis of the effects of net metering.”

With net metering, homeowners can generate their own power and send any surplus power back to the grid, receiving compensation for the power they provide. The practice seemed to make conservatives crazy—the Wall Street Journal called it a form of income redistribution—and Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Energy, which owns NV Energy, had lobbyists dogging state legislatures, courts and utility rate-setting commissions across the nation to put an end to net metering.

The Nevada PUC, assigning credibility to a Buffett claim that non-solar customers were being forced to subsidize solar rooftop users—a claim the PUC’s own staff had discredited—took the senate bill and ran off the end of the Earth with it, ordering reductions in the payments homeowners receive, hitting them with a fee for access to the grid, even applying the fee to those who had outfitted their homes with solar gear that was not yet paid for, defeating the whole purpose of a pro-net metering state policy that was still in place. This was not an “analysis” of net metering. It was war against net metering. A robust young industry in the state collapsed, some firms leaving the state. It turned out that both solar generation and net metering were very popular. This is when a key public misunderstanding developed. The juxtaposition of timing between the net metering fiasco and the drafting of Adelson’s initiative petition led a commonly accepted notion to arise—that the petition, if enacted, would protect net metering.

Actually, the net metering problem is already solved. Gov. Brian Sandoval was blamed by solar panel firms for the fiasco, which was not correct. Sandoval had been unwilling to interfere with the Public Utilities Commission, which is set up in the law to be independent from politicians, but the governor signaled his feelings about what the commissioners had done by his choices for new commissioners as the terms of members expired. His new PUC appointees won praise from renewable energy advocates. PUC chair Joe Reynolds, in particular, was highly regarded. “Joe Reynolds has been a strong leader on the issue,” according to the Southwest Energy

Opponents of Question 3 worked a table at the Efficiency Project’s Nevada representative Nevada Democratic Convention in Reno in June. Tom Polikalas. The new PUC adopted rules protecting net metering. In addition, the Democrats in 2016 regained majorities in both houses of the legislature, and the 2017 legislature enacted a measure sponsored by Assemblymember Justin Watkins that reversed the PUC’s net metering rate change and also enacted an 2014 array of other measures that secured the posi tion of renewable energy in the state. Thus, the net metering problem was many Democrats, solved without Question 3. But the ballot measure does pose other problems. demoralized in the last years of the obama administration, stayed home instead of voting. republican gains were strong.

PHOTO/DENNIS MYERS

the Constitution

In the months after Question 3 won its landslide first-round victory in the 2016 election on the strength of net metering sentiment, it appeared so certain to be enacted in 2018 that Gov. Sandoval appointed a panel to prepare recommendations on how it should be implemented.

But something else also happened. A lot of people who had previously supported the measure under the impression it had to do with net metering got around to reading its language.

There had always been some uneasiness over the fact that Adelson had proposed constitutional instead of statutory changes. There was also concern about going back into the water—the last time Nevada deregulated electricity had been a disaster.

Moreover, the supporters of renewable energy were concerned by what enactment of Question 3 would do to a thriving clean energy movement in the state that’s supported by both state government and by NV Energy.

In earlier years, the efforts of NV Energy—formerly known as Sierra Pacific Power—were grudging and reluctant. Solar isn’t practical, its reps would say. And Q3 supporters, such as former state consumer advocate Jon Wellinghoff, kept alive legitimate reminders of the corporation’s policies: “And don’t forget that it was just a few short years ago that NV Energy effectively killed off the rooftop solar industry in Nevada (because it was eroding its profits), leading to thousands of lost jobs and multiple business closures.”

But the utility now gets good marks from clean energy experts, particularly since its adoption of a new energy plan that includes doubling its level of renewables in the next five years and raising its battery energy capacity. It has contracted with Cypress Creek Renewables, 8minutenergy and NextEra Energy Resources to build new projects.

The Sandoval administration, meanwhile, is running ahead on meeting the goals of President Obama’s Clean Power Plan, which the Trump administration is trying to repeal.

In addition, renewables have become something of a Western cause as Nevada and other states in the West have joined the clean energy effort. Nevada began early on to reduce its reliance on coal.

Environmentalists asked, what would happen to this momentum if Adelson’s partial deregulation hit the state’s power system? What would happen in the turbulence and havoc of creating a new system? On Feb. 5 last year, a group called the Coalition to Defeat Question 3 announced it had been formed to oppose Question 3. It included people and groups the state’s environmental community trusted—the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Sierra Club, Southwest Energy Efficiency Project and Western Resource Advocates. Their participation changed perceptions about which side represented clean energy.

“[T]here is nothing in Question 3 that would promote or enhance clean energy development in the state,” Sierra Club’s Toiyabe Chapter Chair Anne Macquarie told a Carson City luncheon group. “And while the complex new rules are being written— over a period of years to make the transition from a regulated monopoly energy provider to a still-regulated competitive market—we fear clean energy policy initiatives will stall or

2015 the staff of the Public utilities Commission calculated the exit fees.