Dive Brief:

• Indiana lawmakers may consider requiring utilities to file efficiency plans every three years, after the state last year scrapped a law targeting a 2% electricity reduction by the end of 2019.
• The proposal by Gov. Mike Pence (R) would allow utilities to generate their own efficiency plans, but advocates fear that without a mandatory statewide target, the law may be ineffective in promoting energy conservation. 
• Pence last year defunded the state's energy efficiency program, Energizing Indiana. The new proposal would require Indianapolis Power & Light Co. and Duke Energy to file plans beginning 2017.

Dive Insight:

Indiana last year became the first state to roll back energy savings goal when it killed the Energizing Indiana program. Critics say the program was too expensive, and while it returned savings many believed the early gains were giving way to higher costs.

In June, Citizens Action Coalition said the efficiency program would have left state better positioned to meet new EPA rules, and had saved the equivalent of a year's worth of power for 93,000 homes since it began in 2012.

But the Indianapolis Business Journal reports Gov. Mike Pence may float a plan to require the state's investor-owned utilities to submit their own three-year efficiency proposals beginning in 2017. The proposal could be introduced this week by Senate Utilities Committee Chairman Jim Merritt.

The now-defunct energy efficiency program was saving Indiana $3 for every $1 spent on residential efficiency, the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission said in an August report. On the commercial and industrial side, the savings were as much as $5.49 for each dollar spent.