By Flo Nicolas, Get Tech Smart
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Soaring electricity bills are seriously hurting our pocketbooks. This fall, the National Grid warned that New England consumers could see a 64% increase in electricity rates this winter. Eversource New Hampshire customers are now paying 22 cents per kilowatt hour for default service. This is more than double the previous rate. What is the solution to this escalating problem? We will explore some options in the works in Hudson, as well as other communities in the state, called “Community Power.” This idea bands together New Hampshire towns and cities to increase their purchasing power and lower costs. For this episode of Get Tech Smart, we talk to Craig Putnam, the director for the Hudson NH Electric Aggregation Committee; Brett Gagnon, a former board of selectmen liaison for Hudson; and Henry Herndon, a consultant with the Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire. Will these efforts lower your electricity costs?
This transcript has been edited for clarity and length
Flo Nicolas:
Welcome everyone to another episode of Get Tech Smart. I am your host, Flo Nicolas. Today we will discuss why we are seeing our electric bills skyrocketing and whether community power is a solution to help lower consumer electricity costs. To dive into these questions, we will talk to Hudson NH Electric Aggregation Committee Director Craig Putnam, Brett Gagnon, former Board of Selectman liaison, and Henry Herndon, consultant for the Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire. So, Craig, I opened my electric bill one day and thought I forgot to make a
payment the previous month. It had doubled. So tell us what is going on.
Craig Putnam:
Well, what's going on is the increase in price per kilowatt hour. This is what Hudson Community Power is working to address — to bring that kilowatt-hour rate down and give residents more options for purchasing electricity. Recently, legislation at the state level has enabled a new way of going about this. We could create what's called Hudson Community Power, which could replace Eversource as the default electricity supplier for the retail customers — residents and small businesses — in Hudson. (In this scenario) Eversource is still required to be responsible for what they've always been responsible for, which is the delivery and transmission of electricity. So they will still own the power lines, they'll still own the poles, they're still responsible for all the substations, the billing, the meter reading, and all of that. Nothing changes in that regard. If we do this, the only thing changing is who's buying the power for the residents. Today, Eversource buys that on your behalf if you're a default supply customer. That's the technical term for it. And under the new Hudson Community Power scheme, if that goes forward, Hudson Community Power would be arranging to buy that. So the only thing that would change is a single line on your electric bill. It says who bought the power and what the rate is.
Flo Nicolas:
So, Henry, how does the Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire tie into what Hudson Community Power is doing?
Henry Herndon:
The Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire is a new statewide power agency set up on a not-for-profit basis. Its current membership is 24 cities and towns statewide, representing approximately 20% of the New Hampshire population. After the New Hampshire legislation went into effect in 2019 (note: under Community Power programs, local governments can procure and provide electricity to their residents and businesses on a competitive basis), a couple of leading cities, municipal officials, municipal staff, energy experts from around the state, got together and formed a workgroup to learn how community power works in other states. What are the best practices? And how can local groups like Hudson Community Power get a better rate for our customers?
Brett Gagnon:
And if I can add to that: the real goal and the benefit of doing all this is that it's kind of an insurance program in the way it's structured. It combines residents of other communities and allows them to go out in the open market and see who gives the best rate. The power aggregation community is trying to pool our buying power to get customers a lower rate. And to finalize that point, the town (Hudson) has already been doing this for years. All of the town's facilities that we own and operate work with the National Regional Planning Association, and they do the same thing that CPCNH (Community Power Coalition of NH) would do for residents, that is, organize all the town's facilities and buy power at a lower rate. It saved the town, you know, tens of thousands of dollars every year for the past dozen years. And so we're just looking to open it up to the residents. Why can't the residents save money in the same fashion?
Flo Nicolas:
When rates started going up, some residents switched to other suppliers. I've heard that rates started low but increased over time. And then they were locked into these rates for two years of their contract. Will this be a similar scenario?
Henry Herndon:
(Community power programs) are completely voluntary. The way it works, for example, is the town of Hudson presents a plan. They bring that plan to town meeting. If the voters vote for it, the select board is authorized to sign the contracts with providers and launch a program. Every customer in the town of Hudson will receive a notification in the mail outlining the rates compared to Eversource and giving the customer the option to opt-out and go back to Eversource or another supplier. There will also be a menu of options: for example, you can choose a more renewable
energy source.
Brett Gagnon:
We are simply providing more choices. In Hudson, come town meeting in March, residents are asked to vote on this. The warrant article asks residents to vote on giving the authority to the town selectmen to look for better rates. That's all it's doing. It is not locking anything in. So voting in favor of the warrant article allows the selectman to look for better prices. After that, if we go with CPCNH, the residents will have a choice: Do they want the lowest rate? Would they rather spend a little bit more and get green energy? That's an individual choice. It's not a town choice.
Craig Putnam:
Unlike the option now to go with another supplier, I want to be clear that with Hudson Community Power, there is no contract. You don't have a contract today with Eversource, you would because it's the default supplier. Hudson Community Power would also be a default supplier that would replace Eversource if this went forward.
Flo Nicolas:
Has this model been tested out in other areas?
Henry Herndon:
Yeah, absolutely. So many states across the country have a version of community power: Massachusetts, New York, Illinois, Ohio, and California. We are seeing a lot of success in California; they've set up these community power coalitions, these locally controlled agencies that are now in charge of sourcing electricity on behalf of the customers. And they're pushing the boundaries of innovation. So not just lowering costs but also contracting for local renewable energy development to benefit those communities, putting forward innovative programs for low-income customers or residential customers who may want to adopt solar and be compensated intelligently for that. And to circle back to the rate shock we're all experiencing. The cause of the increase is a couple of things, but it is primarily the globalized fossil fuel market. We're seeing the effects of the war in Ukraine and other impacts that are causing the cost of oil and natural gas to skyrocket. And in New Hampshire, we haven't seen a lot of proactive policies to prepare ourselves for resilience to protect ourselves against that. Sixty to 70% of our energy mix in New England comes from natural gas, and that's where we're feeling the pain right now. Some of the more forward-thinking communities are looking at how we will stabilize costs long-term. The way we're going to do that is with resilience. The way we're going to do this is by contracting for local generators here in our town or here in our state and investing in those technologies like energy efficiency, distributed energy products and programs. These are the kind of things that can protect against being overly exposed to globalized markets.
Flo Nicolas:
So, what's the timeline for this to happen in Hudson?
Craig Putnam:
As Brett indicated, the next major step is the warrant article in the spring and the voting. And, let's assume that that passes in that instance, the board of selectmen then has been given the go-ahead from the voters to proceed with the next steps, which would be figuring out who Hudson wants to partner with for procurement and related services like call centers and, and things of that nature. That will take some time. CPCNH is certainly one of the candidates, a very strong candidate.
Henry Herndon:
If there is voter approval in March from the town meeting, it's possible that the program could launch, and folks could start participating in Hudson Community Power in 2023 in the summer or fall. And it could be as late as the spring of 2024. A key thing to understand about community power is that many New Hampshire towns are getting involved, they're coming together, they're learning together, they're developing these programs, and many of them have different motivations. So, they all care about lowering costs, that's for sure. But some of them want to invest in renewable energy. This is one of the cool things about community power — it's not imposing any one set of goals; it's just empowering the individual town to meet its goals. So, there's no requirement that this be renewable energy. There's no requirement that it be this goal or that goal, and it's really up to the town to decide what it wants to achieve.
Craig Putnam:
It's all about local control. For Hudson, another public hearing is coming up on January 17th in the Buxton meeting room in the town hall. The snow date is the 19th. If you have questions or opinions, we'd love to have you show up to the public hearing. There's also a substantial website created by the Hudson Electric Aggregation Committee (hudsonnh.gov/bc-sc/page/electric-aggregation-plan-overview). And there's the cpcnh.org website with lots of information.
Henry Herndon:
And I would say: keep an eye on Nashua; they are a little further along in this process than Hudson is, and they could have a program go live in 2023.
Flo Nicolas:
So, Henry, Craig, and Brett, it's been great having you on the show and outlining Hudson's plan for community power and its potential to reduce electricity costs for residents. Anyone who wants to understand a little bit more about how this program will work, attend the hearing on January 17, bring your questions, and really take the time to fully understand community power before you vote in March. Thank you, everyone again, and thank you, everyone, for watching another episode of Get Tech Smart.
Flo Nicolas is a technologist, lawyer, speaker, mentor, writer, tech startup founder/CEO of CheapCheep, and director/creator of Get Tech Smart. She is a dedicated professional with a passion for technology and creative innovation, intent on helping her community to become more tech-savvy and forward-thinking. Get Tech Smart is being shared with members of The Granite State News Collaborative.