The Town of Apple Valley’s Choice Energy program has accumulated at least $70,000 in legal fees (to Troutman Sanders LLP), has hundreds of thousands in other costs (not counting the $250,000 lockbox deposit), and will require $500,000 in administrative fees annually to pay whichever company the Town chooses to operate it. All this for a few pennies off the cost of energy — only to the consumer. The cost to deliver energy over the grid is still billed to the consumer and if the cost to deliver energy goes up, so does your bill.
And how much energy does the Town contribute to offset these costs? Zero. Not one ampere, watt, or volt.
Nevertheless, all that money has to come from somewhere, and that somewhere
ultimately is out of the revenues of Southern California Edison (SCE). Love ’em or hate ’em, the fact remains that it has costs to cover. If SCE fails to cover those costs, it will not be able to maintain the electrical grid.
Therefore, expect SCE to apply for a rate increase to cover the loss of revenues due to the insertion of middlemen such as the Town of Apple Valley. In other words, the Town’s endless quest for income at any cost will inevitably result in higher electricity prices for everyone.
This is what happens when you insert a do-nothing middleman — the Town of Apple Valley — in a supply chain: For the middleman to get paid, costs must go up for everyone else.
Diana Carloni
Citizens for Government Accountability