Bids for electricity?

How does this work? They were able to solicit bids for electricity?On March 20, 2012, Manhattan Illinois voters approved a referendum allowing the Village of Manhattan to seek lower electric rates for residential and small business customers. The Village of Manhattan received competitive bids and is pleased to announce the selection of First Energy Solutions, Inc. as the supplier of choice for the aggregation program.



ComEd

Village Program With
First Energy Solutions


6.932*

₵/kWh

June 2012 - September 2012



4.58

₵/kWh

July 2012-July 2014

33.9%

Savings on Electric Supply

June 2012 - September 2012



8.32*

₵/kWh

October 2012 – May 2013

44.9%

Savings on Electric Supply

October 2012 – May 2013

* Rates do not include the purchased electricity adjustment (PEA) on accounts where no electric supplier has been selected. The Village's electric consultant has estimated that when the PEA is added to the rates above, the yearly average will be 8.5 cents per kWh. This results in a savings of 46.1% for the year.

Residents began receiving power from First Energy Solutions in July 2012. The cumulative savings for those who switched is over $900,000 in the first year, with many households saving over $50.00 per month during summer months. The savings amounts were calculated based on 2011 electric usage.



Billing, Service to lines, and Delivery
The Village’s aggregation program is for the supply of power only. You will continue to only receive a bill from Com Ed. ComEd will continue to deliver your power, respond to power outages, and maintain the power delivery system.

hmmm interesting

I guess they have more than one power company there.

competition is good.

No actually not. Just like Gulf Power owns all the transmission lines in the two county area......Commonwealth Edison does in the area of these towns....they however, can negotiate with out of state providers and pay the local company transmission fees over their lines. Many cities have opted out of the traditional vertical integration of production and transmission, and are only paying transmission fees as other utilities are able to sell their production of power. The game is rigged, and slowly communities are banding together and saying enough.

2seaoat wrote:No actually not. Just like Gulf Power owns all the transmission lines in the two county area......Commonwealth Edison does in the area of these towns....they however, can negotiate with out of state providers and pay the local company transmission fees over their lines. Many cities have opted out of the traditional vertical integration of production and transmission, and are only paying transmission fees as other utilities are able to sell their production of power. The game is rigged, and slowly communities are banding together and saying enough.

Johnny went walking on a farm in mid kentucky. There were a lot of flies and as he was getting sweaty he noticed they begin to bite him. taking his hand he swatted one and was emmediatly disgusted at the fly guts on his hand. he had no where to wipe so he bent over and drug his hand through the sand.

He kept walking and came upon a unicorn. It had a LARGE white pension. He ask himself, how did that unicorn get such a LARGE white pension. He became fascinated with this pension and was sad his pension wasnt as big. He worried that his girlfreind would look down upon him if she ever found out there was a bigger pension out there and he had not obtained it.

So he decided to kill the unicorn and cut off its pension and strap it on himself. But regulations against that kind of stuff was heavy and he needed to hide his mischevious deed. So he went to the local witch doctor to see if h could attach this pension permanent. The witch doctor did some abracadbras and made him eat some hornets. It worked. His pension was now a permanent fixtuer on his body. He will forever be HORNy.

@Seaoat could it be done in other areas or is it limited to "commonwealth" types of government?. I just found it very interesting. Thanks for your input....

It has been done for years in the midwest. I have talked about the Kane County Cougars....the minor league team which is so successful. Well, the town of Geneva where they play took Commonwealth Edison to court in the early 80s and argued they should be able to buy power from Wisconsin and sell it to their citizens. The courts agreed. In most States the state through a commerce commission sets rates and regulations. More states are allowing municipalities to take over maintenance of the power grid within their cities, and they are starting their own utility department which allows for significant savings for their residents as they purchase large blocks of energy from other utilities.

This type of service is done routinely. The name for using the transmission lines is called "wheeling". Large utilities buy power from each other if generation costs are cheaper from a utility that's cheaper than their own, or if their generation capacity is maxed out and they need more power.

Some of the rural electric cooperatives have no generation capacity and just buy off the market at the cheapest rates available... wherever they can get it off the grid.

I have seen Southern Company's trading floor for power... it's in the bowels of their Birmingham Alabama Power corporate office. It looks like something you would see at NASA mission control, or at the stock exchange... very impressive. Power is bought and sold like a commodity.

Excellent post and response. It is not as simple as cities just opting out. Please see below:


The Illinois Electric Service Customer Choice and Rate Relief Law of 1997 restructured the state's electric service industry to allow a choice of electric suppliers. With electric choice, the electric supply may now be provided by different companies known as Retail Electric Suppliers (RESs).


http://www.pluginillinois.org/about.aspx