REPORT TO COUNCIL
SUBJECT
Title
Action on Amendment No. 1 to the Agreement for Design Professional Services with Electrical Consultants Inc.
Report
COUNCIL PILLAR
Deliver and Enhance High Quality Efficient Services and Infrastructure
BACKGROUND
The City of Santa Clara's Electric Utility, Silicon Valley Power (SVP), has provided dependable electric service for 125 years. SVP's current peak load is about 600 MW and provides nearly 4,110 Gigawatt-hours (GWh) a year to SVP's customers. Currently, eight additional projects have received entitlements with the City of Santa Clara which represents an increase of 618 MW. There is an additional 114 MW of planned Commercial and Residential development. This represents 732 MW of expansion over the next ten years. In addition, new developments have made initial requests for more than 400 MW of new load. Based on SVP's experience with how new load develops, SVP is preparing for its system peak load to double over the next 10 years and increase the number of substations from twenty-three (23) to up to thirty-three (33) by 2026.
On October 13, 2020, City Council authorized the City Manager to execute an agreement with Electrical Consultants Inc. (ECI) for a System Expansion Plan. A System Expansion Plan consists of a short-term and long-term capital improvement plan to accommodate the additional electric load growth due to new development in Santa Clara (Data Centers and Residential Projects).
On September 28, 2021, staff presented the Three-Year System Growth Strategy Plan (Three Year Plan) which was prepared by ECI for SVP and includes an analysis of SVP's transmission system. The purpose of the study is to identify near-term and long-term improvements for SVP to consider in order to maintain electric service reliability with consideration of significant load growth. The Three-Year Growth Strategy is intended to be a living document and will be reviewed and changed in the future to adapt for a number of factors...
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