Clean Energy SF: San Francisco, fog then sun, est. 2026

Vol. 1 - No. 14 - Thursday, September 24, 2026 - Free to readers

Policy ยท Analysis

The 2045 clean power law and the midterm math

SB 100 promises California 100 percent clean retail electricity by 2045. The state's own report cards show which parts of that promise are on pace and which are not.

Filed November 12, 2026 By the Clean Energy SF editors Reading time: 6 minutes

I. What the 2045 law actually requires

Pull up your electricity bill in San Francisco and, unless you opted out, you are a CleanPowerSF customer. The line that matters is the generation charge, the part that pays for the actual power rather than the poles and wires. CleanPowerSF, the city's community choice program run by the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC), buys that power on your behalf, and its default Green service is already mostly renewable. You can pay a little more for SuperGreen, sold as fully renewable.

Behind that choice sits a state law most ratepayers never see. SB 100, signed in 2018, commits California to 100 percent clean retail electricity by 2045, with a renewable portfolio standard (the share of power that must come from sources like solar and wind) climbing to roughly 60 percent by 2030 along the way. The law separates two ideas that sound alike: renewable, and clean. The final 2045 target counts zero-carbon sources that are not technically renewable, which is why carbon-free hydropower, like the Hetch Hetchy system that supplies the city's own buildings, can count toward the goal even when it does not count toward the renewable standard.

II. The honest math on the gap

Every few years three state agencies, the California Energy Commission (CEC), the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), and the California Air Resources Board, publish a joint report on whether the buildout is on pace. At last public report the picture split cleanly. Solar and battery storage are the ahead-of-schedule story: the grid operator, the California Independent System Operator (CAISO), has connected a large and fast-growing fleet of batteries over the past few years, on the order of thousands of megawatts, which is roughly the scale the planners wanted by now.

The behind-schedule story is the harder stuff. Offshore wind off the California coast, long-duration storage that can hold power for many hours, and the new transmission lines to carry all of it are slower, more expensive, and more uncertain than signing another solar contract. The target itself also keeps moving: the CEC's demand forecasts have been rising as buildings, cars, and other loads switch to electricity, so the amount of clean power needed by 2045 is a bigger number than earlier plans assumed. The gap is less about running out of panels and more about everything that has to happen around them.

III. San Francisco's own piece

For a reader here, the statewide law lands in two local programs. CleanPowerSF lets you choose SuperGreen for a small premium, which is the most direct lever an ordinary ratepayer has, and Hetch Hetchy Power already runs the city's municipal buildings and transit on carbon-free hydropower from the Sierra. Neither is large on the scale of the whole California grid, but both are real, checkable, and already past the finish line that the rest of the state is still chasing.

The city's buildings are also where the demand side of the law shows up. As Victorian flats swap gas furnaces and water heaters for electric heat pumps, and as rooftop solar spreads across housing stock that was never designed for it, local electricity use climbs even as it gets cleaner. Fog complicates the rooftop side: the bay's microclimates mean a roof in the Sunset generates differently than one in the Mission on the same afternoon. The honest summary is that San Francisco is ahead on supply and still working through demand, which is a smaller version of the state's whole problem.

IV. Worth watching this month

1. Watch for the next SB 100 joint agency report from the CEC, CPUC, and Air Resources Board, which is the official scorecard on whether the 2045 trajectory still holds; the timing of these reports tends to slip, so treat any announced date as tentative.

2. The CEC's Integrated Energy Policy Report and its demand forecast proceeding are where the moving target gets reset, and a higher forecast quietly widens the gap even if nothing else changes.

3. CPUC procurement and integrated resource planning decisions are worth a look, since they decide how much new clean power and storage the utilities must line up, and these are the orders that actually bend the curve.

4. CleanPowerSF typically publishes an annual power content label and sets rates each year, so check both if you want to confirm what Green and SuperGreen actually contain and what they cost.

5. CAISO's transmission planning, especially anything tied to offshore wind on the North Coast, is the slow-moving piece most likely to decide whether the behind-schedule resources ever arrive.

Frequently asked questions

Does choosing SuperGreen help California hit the 2045 target?

It directly makes your own share of power fully renewable, which is the clearest action an individual ratepayer can take. On the scale of the whole state grid the effect of one account is small, but the program buys the renewable supply on your behalf either way.

Is 100 percent clean the same as 100 percent renewable?

No, and the difference matters. The 2045 target counts zero-carbon sources that are not renewable, such as large hydropower, while the interim renewable standard of roughly 60 percent by 2030 does not. That is why carbon-free hydro can count toward the final goal but not the renewable one.

Who decides whether the state is on track?

Three agencies share the job: the California Energy Commission, the California Public Utilities Commission, and the California Air Resources Board, through a joint SB 100 report. They publish periodically rather than on a fixed annual schedule, so dates move.

What is most likely to cause the state to miss the target?

At last public report the slow pieces are offshore wind, long-duration storage, and new transmission, not solar panels. Rising electricity demand from buildings and vehicles also raises the bar over time.

References