BELCO: No Additional Revenue From Changes
The change to BELCO’s Facilities Charge from a fixed $33 per month fee for all residential customers to a graduated Facilities Charge based on usage was made after an extensive analysis of BELCO’s residential customers’ consumption over a year period, providing no additional revenue, the company said today.
A spokesperson said, “The analysis was performed in conjunction with U.S. based experts who specialize in utility rates and cost of service. The table below uses round numbers for demonstrative purposes, so that customers can easily see the changes.”
“Further detail, including a breakdown of the actual numbers, can be seen in BELCO’s official filing to the Energy Commission. A link to the filing is at the bottom of the new release on BELCO’s website.
“Page seven of the filing to the Energy Commission includes a table titled “Projected Impact of Proposed Graduated Facilities Structure,” where the actual calculations determine that the change will result in BELCO earning approximately $16,000 less in revenue.”
No additional revenue to Belco …. wink, wink.
It makes a mockery of the “facilities’ charge though doesn’t it? This charge was originally implemented to allow Belco to recover the cost of bringing the service to the residence. It should cost the same to bring the electrical service to a 4 bedroom house as it does to bring the service to a studio apartment.
Electricity charges are already charged on a progressive basis with usage at the top tier almost double the charge per kWh over the bottom tier.
Maybe Belco thought it would be a good idea to have larger families subsidize the cost of service for single person households.
The energy commission clearly didn’t give this proposal any thought. They’re about as useful as an electoral commission in Cuba.
I’d like to see the breakdown shown for each month giving percentages of who will pay what per month. Putting it into effect just in time for summer and a unit time.
Does it actually help low income families? Or does it benefit small single occupancy residences? What is the average household income in this category?
What would be nice is if somebody took the time to do a proper analysis. Use the census data to draw upon income, number of residents and children and then some more and cross reference it against belco costs.
Maybe if they lost the fuel adjustment allowance it would help and maybe it would force belco to become more efficient at delivering our energy through solar, wind and ocean rather than dragging their feet.
* a/c unit
Yesterday Belco said that revenues would be neutral. Today they said that they will take in approx $16,00 less in revenues.
When you can’t make up your mind about something, usually you’r lying.
And of course the US firm that “does these kinds of stats” rely on Belco to provide them with the information.
Cold water showers for everyone!
According to my calculations these changes would bring in an extra 3 cents of revenue per customer.
Assuming 100 customers:
26 of them would pay $18 less for the facilities charge (-18 x 26 = -468)
18 of them would pay $8 less for facilities charge (-8 x 18 = -144)
28 would have no change
22 would have an increase of $16.50 (16.5 x 18 = 363)
6 would have an increase of $42 (6 x 42 = 252)
increases: 363 + 252 = 615
decrease: (468) + (144) = (612)
Net increase $3 per 100 customers or 3 cents per customer.
That is assuming that BELCO doesn’t change the rate monthly based on usage. Otherwise they would have significantly more revenue in the summer months when peoples usage increases.