State regulators approve utilities’ requests to end federal power credit on customers’ bills
 
June 6, 2007
UE-071014, 071015 & 071016

State regulators approve utilities’ requests to end federal power credit on customers’ bills

Olympia, Wash. – The Utilities and Transportation Commission (UTC) today approved proposals from the state’s three private-electric companies to remove a federal power system credit from their residential customers’ bills effective June 7.

The companies asked the UTC to allow them to end the monthly credits to their customers because the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) stopped making payments to the utilities. BPA took the action in response to a recent federal court ruling that the formula BPA used to distribute federal power benefits to customers of northwest private utilities violated federal law.

The benefit appeared as a credit on private electric residential and small-farm utility customers’ bills. The private-electric companies have not increased the amount they charge for electricity, but without the federal credit, customers will see higher bills.

“We have no practical alternative to eliminating the billing credit,” said Mark Sidran, chairman of the UTC. “The credit is a direct pass-through by the utilities to their customers of a federal benefit they receive from BPA. Since the utilities are receiving no payments from BPA, they have no benefit to pass through.”

The commission’s actions do not affect municipal utilities, such as Seattle City Light, or public utility districts. The three private-electric utilities serve 1.2 million households representing 45 percent of the residential customers in Washington.

Puget Sound Energy customers will see their bills increase by an average of $10.28 a month. Pacific Power’s typical residential bill will increase $11.49 a month while Avista’s average bill will go up $5.23 monthly.

The UTC has joined the utility commissions in Oregon, Idaho and Montana to ask the U.S. Justice Department to allow BPA to seek rehearing of the case.

The three-member commission regulates the rates and services provided by the state’s three private electric utilities. Those companies are Puget Sound Energy serving 995,000 customers, primarily in Western Washington; Pacific Power, with 124,000 customers in the Yakima and Walla Walla areas; and Avista, serving 227,700 customers in Eastern Washington.