Church client in Shreveport, SWEPCO Rate 23 General Service Demand. The church peaks at 280 kW during Sunday services but runs at 40-50 kW the rest of the week. The ratchet is killing them ? billing at 224 kW minimum when actual demand is 40 kW six days a week. Are there any exemptions or special rates for houses of worship or nonprofits that reduce demand charges?
Demand charge exemptions for churches and nonprofits?
Marie ? in Arkansas, Entergy has a Church Service rate that eliminates the ratchet for verified religious institutions. Check if SWEPCO has something similar. Some Louisiana utilities also have institutional or intermittent service rates designed for facilities that have high peak but very low average demand ? exactly the church load profile.
In Oklahoma, OG&E offers a Power and Light rate PL for accounts with low load factors. Churches typically qualify because their load factor is very low ? high peak during services, minimal baseload the rest of the week. The PL rate has a lower demand charge but higher energy charge. For low load factor accounts the total bill is lower on PL than on general demand service.
Arthur and Charles ? SWEPCO does not have a church-specific rate. But they do have a Small General Service rate SGS that has no demand charge at all for accounts under 50 kW. My church client exceeds 50 kW so they dont qualify. However SWEPCO also has Rate 24 Large Power and Light with a lower demand charge structure for intermittent loads. Researching whether the church qualifies.
Churches are great audit targets because of the extreme load profile mismatch. In Tallahassee I moved a megachurch from Duke FL GSDT-1 to GSD non-demand rate by installing a demand limiter that kept peak below the 25 kW demand rate threshold. The church shed non-essential loads during peak and the total bill dropped 35%. Required some creative load management during peak services.
Entergy Louisiana has specific provisions for houses of worship under their institutional tariff. The demand charge is reduced by 40% for qualified religious and educational institutions. We moved three churches in Baton Rouge onto the institutional tariff and combined annual savings exceeded $22,000. Always check for institutional, educational, or religious rate classifications ? theyre more common than most auditors realize.