With temperatures rising and energy bills doing the same, Santa Monica residents may be able to look forward to more cost-friendly utilities in the future.
The city of Santa Monica and electricAmerica, one of the nation’s leading energy service providers, announced this week that they will prepare a report to help the city determine the feasibility of implementing a “Community Choice Aggregation” plan.
The plan would analyze the historical electric consumption information of a city’s anticipated customer portfolio in order to plan future wholesale power purchases.
The city would still use local electric utilities for transmitting and distributing energy, but it would have the option of contracting out the functions of buying power at wholesale and retail rates.
In essence, City Hall could combine its energy load with industrial, commercial and residential customers within municipal boundaries to make energy cheaper for everyone.
Made possible by the passage of Assembly Bill 117 in September 2002, “Community Choice Aggregation” seems to be gaining momentum in California as more cities and counties look for ways to reduce energy costs for their constituents, increase administrative control over state energy efficiency and conservation funds and deliver more environmentally friendly sources of power.
“We believe that Community Choice Aggregation can provide environmental, monetary and other benefits to the city of Santa Monica and its constituents,” said Susan Munves, the city’s Energy and Green Building Program administrator. “We are excited to begin investigating the viability of such a plan and are fortunate to be working with our energy service provider, electricAmerica, to help us determine how to best move forward.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on April 30, 2004. Read the original PDF.