5th Installment Features ……
info from the City of Peoria
[Editor’s Note: The Community Word offers this column to various agencies and governmental organizations in an effort to inform the public just what it is that they do for our Peoria-area community. This month the City ofPeoria wants you to know about the new Municipal electric opt-out aggregation program coming soon!]
Electricity Savings Coming Soon!
Municipal electric opt-out aggregation is an exciting opportunity for the residents and small commercial customers of Peoria (and its neighbors) to save up to 30% off the energy supply costs on their electricity bills. For an average user that could be as much as $200 per household per year, and it all comes down to bulk purchasing.
Illinois state law entitles municipalities to put all eligible residential accounts out to bid as one block. The City of Peoria, with the assistance of a consulting firm called Good Energy, is bidding its accounts competitively with the nation’s largest and most responsible Alternative Retail Electricity Suppliers (ARES).
Electricity savings in this area are some of the best in the country and the timing is excellent because electricity wholesale markets are at a ten year low. Also, in order to maximize its buying power, Peoria has joined forces with 55 other governments in Central Illinois (including East Peoria, Pekin and Peoria Heights) to form the largest municipal electric opt-out buying group in the state. About 200,000 households will combine to form an unprecedented buying group. The winning price will be significantly better than any other available offer being made by suppliers to individuals.
Once the supplier is chosen in early May, the winning supplier will send out a letter in a City of Peoria envelope (or the stationery of your municipality) to all eligible households explaining the savings offer. This letter will also provide an opportunity to exit the program (“opt-out”) at no cost as long as you return the form within 15 days of receipt. Also, soon after that, Ameren will send you notice of the switch giving you a second opportunity to opt-out. To enjoy the savings you need do nothing and all eligible accounts will be automatically enrolled.
At all times Ameren will remain your electricity delivery company. If there is any outage of any kind you will receive exactly the same quality of service from Ameren. Ameren Illinois is a power delivery company; it does not make any profit from the supply portion of your electric bill and it makes no difference to them if you change your electric supplier. You will still receive one bill from Ameren, with the new supplier’s electricity price as a line item on that bill. It is also important to note that those people who have already chosen another supply option with an ARES, or are part of one of Ameren’s optimized pricing programs (like PowerSmart Pricing) will not be enrolled.
Through this program a single household can gain access to the kind of pricing normally reserved for the largest commercial energy user. Municipal electric opt-out aggregation is an efficient tool for spreading the benefits of electricity cost savings throughout the community. When all is said and done these savings in the Peoria community will run into the millions of dollars. If you are considering switching your electricity provider to one of the companies that has made you an offer, we suggest you so wait until the City’s aggregate price is announced so that you can do some true comparison shopping. If you sign up with another supplier now it may difficult to join the aggregation group
Have questions? Call (309)245-4566 or check out www.munienergychoice.com.