Weeks of dry weather last fall left Juneau’s Snettisham hydroelectric water supply too low to meet the power needs of AEL&P’s largest interruptible customer.
This may have meant diesel generators were running at Greens Creek Mine, but in the end it could mean higher rates for all customers.
Wet summer months in 2012 raised water levels at Snettisham’s Long Lake and Crater Lake and allowed Alaska Electric Light and Power to credit its customers .07 cents per kWh currently. The summer turned into a dry fall and that credit turned into a charge —one that could cost AEL&P’s average customer an extra $10 a month.
The utility filed for a change to its Cost of Power Adjustment for April 1 through June.
“January and February were warm and wet, so it can be hard for people to remember that October, November and December were cold and dry comparatively,” AEL&P spokesperson Debbie Ferreira said. “The COPA filing for April 1, 2013 is the result of what happened in the fall and early winter and the decision to disconnect our interruptible customers as a result.”
When Juneau’s hydroelectric sources have excess water, what would normally bypass Snettisham’s turbines is used to generate power for large energy users that have alternative power sources such as the federal building, Greens Creek and some cruise ships. Greens Creek was disconnected first on Dec. 1, 2012, with the rest to follow on Jan. 14.
“Turning off a large interruptible customer does have an impact on our … non-interruptible customers,” according to a November AEL&P press release. “The ability to sell surplus energy directly benefits customers by lowering energy costs in the form of a COPA credit. When energy isn't available for surplus sales, then we don't have those surplus revenues to help subsidize the cost of energy to the firm customers.”
Sitka saw low lake levels at its hydroelectric source. The city was forced to supplement its hydro power with about 1 percent diesel power.
Ferreira said a relatively wet and warm January and February has helped lake levels to improve.
“We were able to reconnect our dual fuel customers as of March 1,” Ferreira said. “We expect to reconnect Greens Creek as soon as lake levels allow.”
• Contact reporter Russell Stigall at 523-2276 or at russell.stigall@juneauempire.com.
Comments (18)
Add commentA new poolside bar...
...at the COPA Cabana!
Groan.....
Hummm...time for a windmill?
Bartlett?
Bartlett Hospital is an interruptible customer like Greens Creek? First I've heard of that. Better make sure I schedule my heart attack during a rainy spell.
And skirkz, I have only one thing to say to you: "Oh pool boy...!"
Southeast needs more hydro
Southeast Alaska needs more hydroelectricity, period. We don't need to spend $500 MILLION on wood pellets like the Southeast Alaska Integrated Resource Plan calls for we need hydro power! Senator Murkowski, Begich and Congressman Young all support the development of hydro electricity and the building of a Southeast Grid.
Governor, you need to terminate the morons who developed the SEIRP and sue the consultant who took a million dollars to tell us to burn wood pellets to heat our homes and power our industry.
Southeast Alaska has the potential to be the "greenest, cleanest" economy in America, if we would just tap our excessive abundance of Hydroelectricity!
Just a taste
Here's for the big oil haters. Just a little taste of what big electricity can do. Yes, the interuptable customers can be shut off, but it's still going to cost you more.
We're still paying for the 20
We're still paying for the 20 year tower tax, now they want more?
It just might be time to
It just might be time to start investing in solar panels, windmills and my OWN hydro........
AEL&P
They told us that Lake Dorothy would supplement low water levels at Snettisham. Is Lake Dorothy not working after they went millions of dollars over budget to build it?
billb
According to RCA documents filed by AEL&P, AEL&P sold about 10 percent more electricity in 2012 than 2011 while telling the public that demand is barely growing.
Demand for electricity is growing substantially faster than AEL&P can deliver and it is costing the rate payers of Juneau. Currently AEL&P is a protected monopoly and it is time for that game of monopoly to come to an end.
Juneau needs independent power producers to sell electricity into the Juneau market as long as the can do it for less the AEL&P, Given AEL&P's past incompetence in the construction of Lake Dorothy which has been costing Juneau rate payers for the past several years, that should be like snagging salmon in front of Dipac.
Sweetheart Lake Project
Juneau HydroPower's propopsed Sweetheart Lake Project is the only possible competition to AEL&P in the near term. It looks like they are still actively pursuing permitting from the FERC.
I'm sure BJF will be telling his clients to invest heavily in this venture as it'll be a guaranteed money maker! Just like snagging chums in August at DIPAC.
Comment
I don't know much of anything about electricity and I don't know AELP except as a consumer. But my long experience as a Juneau consumer of electricity has been that AELP delivers on time and inexpensively compared with other utilities such as CBJ water and sewer, and ACS and GCI phone and Internet service, and local garbage service.
Alaska is a place that draws dreamers and schemers. People who have never produced a kilowatt promote their get-rich schemes to government. They say, "With your money, your land, your water, and permits from you we can produce power at the price we claim even though we have never built anything in our lives up to now." AELP on the other hand actually produces what they say they will produce, and Snettisham and Lake Dorothy are examples of that.
So while I wish power was free and it's fun to dream about free love and nickel beer I am grateful for AELP and have no regret when I pay them each month. I feel much better about paying AELP than I do filling up my truck at Fred Meyer, and if AELP varied their price for energy as much as gasoline prices fluctuate we would all be holding demonstrations at the AELP office. I have lived and worked all over Alaska and there is no city or village that would not prefer AELP over what they have.
Brad
AEL&P will continue to gouge the consumers as long as the general public will NOT support fighting them. People said that they were against the increases, but only a few of us did all work.
billb
If AELP is gouging us then they are far behind a long list that includes CBJ property taxes, CBJ utilities, the garbage service, phone and Internet service, retail gasoline and diesel, Alaska Airlines, CBJ harbor fees, and statewide health care costs. When I flip a switch the power comes on and at a cost at or below Lower 48 costs but when I pay CBJ I pay (most often not optional or discretionary) more than people pay in the Lower 48 even though city government down there typically provides garbage and recycling as part of government. Phone and Internet is much more competitive in the Lower 48. Health care costs are up to 36 times more expensive here than in Seattle for some medical procedures. Alaska Airlines has a monopoly that is largely unregulated.
So on the whole I do not believe AELP is gouging me at all. I would be curious to see any data that show otherwise.
Also, what city government tells me often turns out to not have been true. AELP seems to give honest, straightforward assessments of the situation.
Power costs
We have it pretty good for Alaska, though our hydro rate exceeds the cost of hydro anywhere else in the country. About 12 cents/KWH is average overall in the US.
However, I'm concerned about the rising demand issue Mr. Fleutsch raised. Geez, 2012 was wetter than normal overall. So now, if we get a couple dry months in a row we're in trouble? But, a dry Fall is pretty rare in these parts.
Thayer Creek
Junkie, it is not so much about competition with AEL&P, it is just Juneau needs more electricity and AEL&P does not have the resources to meet the growing demand in Juneau.
Sweetheart Creek is an excellent project, but Thayer Creek in Angoon can be scaled to nearly the same size as Sweetheart and is farther down the track to boot. BTW, it is not one or the other, Juneau and Southeast Alaska needs both!
Gastineau Channel has great potential for generating tidal power. Yes, off the shelf tidal generators, the problem is selling the electricity in Juneau, because AEL&P has the monopoly they can block selling low cost power in favor of making the rate payers purchase significantly more expensive Lake Dorothy power or diesel generated power.
Protecting its monopoly is AEL&P's primary mission forcing Juneau rate payers to cover its incompetence and still pay a return to its owners.
What if?
the most hated question... but WHAT IF all the minerals mined in Southeast was processed in Southeast?
Just how much more energy would that take?
How many more jobs would that create?
Just how many more homes, cars, schools, teachers, policeman, fireman would all that growth, pure economic growth create?
And the Environmental lobby says what? At the Red Dog, the water is cleaner, the environment is better, and more locals are employed at high wage jobs.
Ba ha!
When will AEL&P learn to go with the flow?