We've had three major storms hit East Tennessee in the past month and TVA keeps implementing emergency rate adjustments. My commercial clients are getting hammered with demand charges they never saw coming. One manufacturing plant got hit with a $18,000 spike in March alone because their demand peaked during the emergency pricing window. Anyone else seeing utilities use weather events as an excuse to jack up rates? I'm starting to think we need to push back harder on these so-called emergency provisions.
Anyone else dealing with crazy weather affecting utility operations?
Oh Terry, you have no idea. CPS Energy here in San Antonio went absolutely nuts after that ice storm in February. They implemented something called a "system recovery charge" that wasn't even in the published tariff. I've got three clients who got bills that were 40% higher than normal, all because of this mystery charge. When I called to complain, they said it was approved by city council in an emergency session. Since when do emergency sessions override published rate schedules?
Same thing happening in Ohio. FirstEnergy has been pulling this stunt for years, but they've gotten more aggressive lately. After that derecho last summer, they started adding "storm recovery fees" to every commercial account over 500 kW. The kicker is they're calculating it based on peak demand during the storm period, not normal operations. One of my clients in Akron saw their effective rate jump from $0.08 to $0.14 per kWh. That's nearly double!
You guys are preaching to the choir. ComEd pulled the same garbage after those tornadoes hit the south suburbs. They called it an "infrastructure resilience adjustment" and stuck it right on the demand charge line. My restaurant client in Orland Park went from a $2,800 monthly bill to $4,100 overnight. The worst part? They applied it retroactively to the previous billing cycle. I'm filing formal complaints with the ICC on three accounts right now.
This is exactly why we need better documentation of these emergency provisions. I started keeping a spreadsheet of every "weather-related" rate adjustment I see. Austin Energy tried to sneak in a $0.003/kWh "grid modernization surcharge" after those floods last year. When I dug into the tariff, there was a tiny footnote about extreme weather events. These utilities are getting way too creative with their interpretations.
Angela, that spreadsheet idea is brilliant. We should all be tracking this stuff systematically. I've noticed TVA tends to implement these charges during the summer peak season, claiming it's related to winter storm recovery. Last July they added a $1.50/kW "system reliability charge" to every account over 1 MW. When I questioned it, they said it was still related to March storm damage. Six months later! The math doesn't add up.
You know what really gets me? Wisconsin Public Service pulled this after that blizzard in 2011 and they're STILL adding storm recovery charges two years later. My paper mill client is paying an extra $3,200 monthly for something that supposedly happened before I even started working with them. When does it end? These charges seem to have a way of becoming permanent once they're implemented.