Justin Kale is letting us know there is still time to take action to keep our electricity bills manageable.

You have probably begun to see the electricity pricing now hitting the news cycle this past weekend in Cleveland and Columbus. This means you likely have begun to explore the topics of “how is this possible?” or “what’s going on in Ohio?” or “what am I going to do about it?”

Dayton and Cincinnati are not going to avoid pricing increases either. The Dayton area just saw a similar uptick last year with AES going from under $0.05 per generated kiloWatt-hour (kWh) to over $0.10/kWh and the Cincinnati area saw Duke prices gradually rise over the past couple of years and are currently at just under $0.07/kWh.

Columbus news – AEP 1

Columbus news – AEP 2

Cleveland news – First Energy

Northern Ohio (and even some areas as close to Central Ohio as Plain City and Marysville areas) is served by First Energy Corporation’s subsidiaries: Toledo Edison, Ohio Edison, or The Illuminating Company. Their prices have been consistently in flux in the recent past but are projected to spike upwards to at or near $0.10/kWh while the same is set in motion for AEP-Ohio which will see a similar 30% increase on generation prices.

The Doom

News has picked up as this outcome comes closer to a deadline. May 2023 will end the current PJM delivery year. What? PJM is a regional transmission organization who basically is the conductor of the electricity band making sure all the appropriate instruments get played at the right time. Think back to Christmas Eve 2022 when we were asked to conserve electricity because the grid was expected to reach its limit for providing electricity. That request came from PJM and then was disbursed to us via our electric provider. Similarly, the electricity grid has many different instruments that power the plants who generate electricity, coal, natural gas, solar, wind, etc.

Columbus and Cleveland news alike have picked up on something that has been simmering in the energy market for the past couple years. Typically, there had been an annual “auction” for pricing to be put in place for any consumer (commercial, industrial, and residential) that does not sign up with a Competitive Retail Electric Service (CRES). This is called the price to compare (or PTC). These auctions set pricing for a future delivery year defined as July through June of following year of electricity delivery. The auctions are held by PJM, which is essentially the conductor of the electric grid governing where, and how the electrons flow https://learn.pjm.com/electricity-basics/market-for-electricity. They make sure the power stays on, and the utilities pass along the price to do so to the consumer regardless of their selection of a CRES or using the standard utility price. The PTC gives a consumer a comparable rate at time of comparison.

A lot of good things can happen when you take the time to look at CRES and lock in pricing during these uncertain times. Geopolitical, weather, regulatory, and a number of other factors cause the erratic price fluctuations in the market. For most small, and even for many large businesses, the forecasting of electric use is usually defined by their operations and by weather. Ongoing efforts to improve energy efficiency and potentially adopt, onsite renewable energy mix into the recipe of energy management.

The Solution

There is still time to lock in a price for your electricity, but the time to act is now because if you wait until May the new contract price will not go into effect until after this rate hike.

Commercial or industrial consumers should review CRES options through a competitive bid process: Energility can facilitate and review your options.

Email – info@energility.com

Call – 614-754-8468

Residential consumers:

Use Public Utility Commission of Ohio (PUCO) Apples-to-Apples site to select an option. . This past weekend there were still several options that were much lower than the price increase we will see in June.

Some final thoughts that can pertain to commercial or residential accounts:

• If you already have a CRES, it may be time to renew that to lock in your current price.
• If you are in the City of Columbus but served electricity by AEP-Ohio you may be part of the City’s aggregation program. Your current bill states “Dynegy is supplier at $0.07884/kWh.” This is the same thing as a CRES.
• Most municipalities and co-ops are not part of this increase