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Why Communities Are Choosing Their Own Energy Future with Cara Renee · Auto Collabs

• 0:00
  Welcome to Auto Collapse. You're listening to an exclusive series recorded live at Automobility LA 2025 in partnership with Cars Commerce. All right.
• 0:08
  I am sitting here at Automobility LA with Cara Renee, Director of Communications and Marketing at the Clean Power Alliance.
• 0:16
  Uh, I've already enjoyed getting to know you over the last, I don't know, 20 minutes since we just met. Uh, and, and your smile and passion are, uh, passion are infectious.
• 0:25
  [laughs] So thanks for joining us here on the stage. Thanks, Kyle. It's great to be here this morning. All right.
• 0:29
  So, um, you're, you're probably not known by most of our audience, but can you give us a little bit of background on what the Clean Power Alliance is, uh, here in Southern California? Absolutely.
• 0:39
  We used to think we were the best-kept secret, but not so much anymore. [laughs] Uh, we are an electricity provider to 36 cities and the unincorporated areas of LA County and Ventura County.
• 0:52
  And we are a not-for-profit energy provider. Yeah. So basically, we buy clean energy, renewable energy, solar, wind, geothermal, and we put it on the grid to make Southern California cleaner and more sustainable. Yeah.
• 1:08
  In, in California and espe- especially, there's a, a lot of concern not just for clean power, but power in general, and so any s- net new supply of power options, um, for customers is, is a big deal.
• 1:23
  And you were talking a, a lot about it's not just about what the supply is, being, being clean, but also, um, the affordability of it for a municipa- mu- municipality and its constituents.
• 1:35
  Talk about how you're kind of balancing both of those, the, the clean power as well as its affordability. Absolutely. Well, there's a demand.
• 1:43
  Let's just say that, uh, Clean Power Alliance is the leading green power provider in the United States, and the reason- Wow...
• 1:49
  that we are and how we got there in such a short amount of time is the communities are demanding renewable energy. They wanna meet their climate goals.
• 1:58
  They wanna make sure that their communities are clean for future generations. So we are purchasing renewable energy on their behalf, and we're doing it for long periods of time into the future.
• 2:10
  We call them power purchase agreements, and that basically means we are securing clean energy for a long time, 20 years into the future. Multiple, uh, sources around the country.
• 2:21
  We try to keep it as local as possible, and that allows us to keep it affordable.
• 2:25
  We know we lock in prices for decades to come, and that's important because as a not-for-profit, uh, we're not like an investor-owned utility. Our revenues go back into the communities.
• 2:38
  We support critical infrastructure. We put money into college scholarships. We invest in workforce development, so there's- Ah... the next generation of clean energy workers.
• 2:49
  And we can do all that in the model, in the nonprofit model that we have to make sure that energy is affordable.
• 2:55
  We know electricity bills can be high, but through the programs that we have and the, the, the efforts that we're making, we make sure it's as affordable as possible. Yeah. That's so close to heart.
• 3:06
  I mean, our whole mission at More Than Cars is to make automotive retail an industry that people fight to join, and I think what you're saying is, hey, we're not just trying to provide the power, but we're trying to provide the people and human resources to make this a reality long into the future, right?
• 3:21
  Absolutely. Your motto, love people then more than cars, I mean, that's... We are very local. So we're locally governed.
• 3:27
  Our board of directors that visions out what we should be doing is comprised of elected officials from every community we serve. So we're local, local, local.
• 3:37
  We wanna make sure that we are representing the needs on the ground in our, the very diverse customer base that we have, and that's, that's keeping us growing. And, and we continue to grow.
• 3:48
  We just added three new cities this year. It's a model that they want. Yeah. Well, first of all, we'll license love people more than you love power over to you whenever you'd like it to be.
• 3:57
  [laughs] Uh, but, but, uh, talk about how communities can think about getting involved in this. Like, what should they be looking at?
• 4:06
  How should they be thinking about getting involved in a program like this, and why it might matter to the people in their communities? Well, it really starts at the, the city level.
• 4:16
  So if a city is looking for reaching climate goals or what they wanna do, they start a conversation with us a couple of years before they would even join Clean Power Alliance.
• 4:28
  We're in something called a joint powers authority, which brings municipalities together and is what serves as the, uh, basis for, for what we do. So they have a conversation.
• 4:39
  They let us know what we're trying to achieve. They vote. I mean, this is a city's decision to join Clean Power Alliance. Gotcha.
• 4:46
  And once they make that decision, then we work with them in going through a process of, you know, making sure that we can support the power needs.
• 4:54
  They make a decision what of the energy options do they want to serve the residents and businesses, and then it's usually about a two-year process- Wow... and then they join. Yeah.
• 5:06
  And then the customers, uh, residents, and businesses within that have options. Like I said, we have three energy options that we offer. We wanna make sure people know that they have choice. It's not a one-size-fits-all.
• 5:18
  That's the whole point of the model that we offer. Okay. And we have a very high, uh, participation rate that has continued in all the years that we've been in existence, so I think we have a good thing going.
• 5:30
  As you think into the future, and energy demands are rising rapidly, um, from, you know, we're at an auto show, uh, obviously with electrification coming to auto, um, specifically here in California, AI demands dema- the demand for power even in a household or a business grows.
• 5:48
  Um, how do you all see yourselves evolving to meet those needs and, and meet the m- needs of these, these communities? Clean Power Alliance has been a leader in investing in battery storage, solar battery storage.
• 6:00
  So- Okay... uh, and, and it is something that the state of California has said has really helped tamper down, I don't wanna say eliminate, you never know what the future could bring, but tamper down energy emergencies.
• 6:12
  Ah.
• 6:13
  So the last time the state of California had those flex alerts and the grid really being so stressed was 2022, and since then, through historic investments that we've made in solar battery storage and around the state-That is making sure that there is enough power supply to meet the demands.
• 6:32
  So storage as a mechanism for future power demand is something that I just haven't heard a ton of, right? It's always kind of, like, real time, what do we need right now?
• 6:40
  And like you said, those r- rolling, rolling flex times are, are, uh, have been a communication thing that's happened in auto a lot because, hey, as consumers need the power to go to get around, it's, it's been a concern.
• 6:53
  So I love that you're addressing that concern. That's one of the things.
• 6:56
  I mean, we have to continue, the state of California has to continue to build infrastructure to make sure that we can get more clean energy, and that is a conversation that's been happening at the legislature.
• 7:07
  Uh, the state just passed a whole package of, of bills that are looking to make sure that we can move more quickly for that kind of infrastructure.
• 7:14
  That's important to us because we're ready to buy more clean energy and bring it here. [laughs] We just have to find the pathways to do that. That's so cool. Yeah.
• 7:22
  Well, Cara, thank you so much for spending a little bit of time.
• 7:24
  Your passion for this, for consumers, for, for, for municipalities and bringing clean energy is, is felt, uh, and seen, and, and I'm excited to kind of see what you do next, so. Well, can I make one more mention?
• 7:36
  You can, please. All right. I just want to say that the reason we're here is our EV Smart Charge program. So- Ah, yeah. Yeah.
• 7:43
  So we are the sponsor of the EV test track, and our EV Smart Charge program is one of the things that we're doing to make it easy to expand EV adoption.
• 7:52
  It's a program that there's a simple app that you can charge your car at home and save money. What it does- Wow... is because, you know, clean energy is a commodity like anything else, and prices are- Sure... changing.
• 8:03
  It helps you customize the charging at home so your car is ready when it needs to be, but it's gonna charge, whether it's the day or the night, at the time when energy prices are low. So customers are saving money.
• 8:16
  Really smart, yeah. And that is a big part of what we're doing at Clean Power Alliance.
• 8:20
  We're investing in charging infrastructure, over $11 million in investment to bring more public charging online, to provide quarter of a million dollars to communities for funding so they can electrify their municipal fleets.
• 8:35
  That's a big part of what we're doing here at the auto show- Wow, so cool... is talking about that. Yeah.
• 8:40
  And so we're, we're very proud to be in that space, and we're excited to be among all the EVs that are here as well. That's so cool. Like, it's, it, it's like an optimizer for all of your charging needs- Yeah...
• 8:50
  for the fleets, for the consumer. Um, that's, it's a really neat thing, and I'm sure a lot of people are gonna wanna take a drive in that EV test track. Come to the EV test track. Come say hello to Clean Power Alliance.
• 9:01
  Very cool. Yeah. Cara, thanks for hanging out with us today. All right. Thank you, Kyle. [upbeat music] Thank you for listening to this LA Auto Show session, brought to you by Cars Commerce.
• 9:09
  At More Than Cars, we're obsessed with uniting people around one big idea, to make retail auto an industry that people fight to join.
• 9:17
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