Category Archives: AmerenCILCO

AmerenCILCO, City of Peoria

My energy supplier has switched from Ameren to … Ameren? (UPDATED)

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It appears that my electricity generator has changed from Ameren to Ameren, and now I’m saving money. Somehow.

As you may know, getting electricity to your home involves two companies (theoretically, at least): the company that generates (or supplies) electricity and the company that delivers electricity. In Peoria, Ameren Illinois delivers your electricity, and their rates are regulated by the Illinois Commerce Commission. Ameren Illinois also supplies electricity, and up until recently has been the default supplier in Peoria, but you can choose a different supplier if you wish. [I was mistaken. Ameren Illinois does not supply electricity — they procure electricity under regulations established by the Illinois Power Agency (IPA). Residents can, however, choose a different supplier.]

In the last election, citizens of Peoria and many other communities passed referenda allowing municipalities to negotiate better electricity rates for their residents with electricity suppliers. Peoria got a great deal with a company called Homefield Energy, which is the City’s new default energy supplier, learn how to make money and how to become a fitness influencer. Here’s part of the City’s press release from earlier this month:

Homefield Energy (www.homefieldenergy.com) was selected as the winning supplier. Homefield offered the lowest price with a two-year contract price of $0.0408 per kilowatt hour (kWh). This price is more than two cents lower than the current Ameren tariff rate of $0.0620 per kWh. The price is also based on the electricity being sourced from 100% renewable electric production.

And just who is Homefield Energy? On the legal page of their website we find out that Homefield Energy is really “Ameren Energy Marketing Company d/b/a Homefield Energy….” Ameren Illinois and Ameren Energy Marketing Company are all part of Ameren Corporation.

So we’ve switched from Ameren [undisclosed suppliers with rates established according to IPA regulations] to Ameren [rates established through competitive bidding directly with municipalities] and saved two cents per kilowatt hour (kWh) — and provided the City of Peoria with a “modest income source” of $0.001/kWh. Apparently there are savings in Ameren’s left pocket that we’ve been missing out on because we’ve been getting our energy from their right pocket all these years. I wonder if there are more savings to be had in their other pockets that we don’t yet know about. [This makes a lot more sense now; my thanks to the City of Peoria and “Cassie” from Ameren for helping to explain it.]

AmerenCILCO, State Legislation, State of Illinois

Ameren touts benefits of rate relief

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Ameren is pleased with the new rate relief package that was unveiled yesterday. A press release from Ameren today explains why:

Gary L. Rainwater, chairman, president and chief executive officer of Ameren Corporation, noted: “This comprehensive rate relief package provides significant benefits to our Illinois electric customers, while benefiting our shareholders by providing legislative stability. It also avoids a costly, lengthy and undesirable court battle to overturn a rate freeze and power generation tax.”

That “legislative stability” is a provision of the relief package that states, “The General Assembly leadership agrees not to pass legislation that would freeze or reduce electric rates, or impose a tax, special assessment or fee on electricity generators through
Aug. 1, 2011.” So the charges of collusion are dropped and the threat of an imminent rate freeze is dropped. Ameren’s happy, and Ameren’s shareholders are happy.

How about Ameren’s customers? I think they’re going to be happy, too. Here are a couple of pie charts that Ameren released today to show the effect this rate relief will have on customers’ electric bills:

Ameren Chart Before Rate Relief

Ameren Chart After Rate Relief

Of course these graphs only depict 2007 rate increases, since they’re phasing in the rate increases over three years (January 2007 through December 2009). To make up for the higher rates we’ve been paying since January, Ameren will be mailing us all rebate checks. Ameren has provided this graphic to explain how much we may be getting:

Typical Residential Credits

All this will be funded by the electricity-generating companies — the ones who made out like bandits in the reverse auction deal:

The $1-billion statewide rate relief package will be funded by contributions of $150 million from Ameren-affiliated companies and $800 million from Exelon-affiliated companies, with the remainder coming from other electric generating companies in the state. Ameren Corporation expects earnings per share will be reduced by approximately 26, 11, 7 and 1 cents per share in 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010, respectively, as a result of the rate relief package.

You can read the full press release from Ameren here. The Citizens Utility Board is cautiously optimistic about this deal, and as far as I know they’re not receiving any money from the power companies this time around. So far, this appears to be a good deal for everyone. Only time will tell if it really is or not.

AmerenCILCO, State Legislation, State of Illinois

Rate relief likely to pass

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Ameren LogoThe Springfield State Journal-Register reports that although no votes have been taken yet, the rate relief package unveiled yesterday is likely to pass. Indeed, everyone seems to be happy with the plan, even Ameren. So it appears to be a win-win-win.

As I understand it, there’s a short-term and long-term component. In the short-term, rate increases will be phased in. That means we’ll be getting a refund for electric rate increases over the first seven months of this year and then lower, but gradually increasing bills from now until 2010, when we’ll be back up to paying market rates again.

As for the long-term:

The main component of the long-term reform involves creation of the Illinois Power Authority, which will oversee state-regulated utilities’ purchase of electricity in the future. Once the IPA is launched, the reverse auction that was used last year to set the present electric rates will be discontinued.

The reverse auction improperly led to “windfall profits” for power generators, including those sharing a parent company with ComEd and Ameren, said Michael Madigan, who touted the benefits of the IPA at every stop on the fly-around.

You may recall that Attorney General Lisa Madigan filed a lawsuit against the energy companies involved in the reverse auction accusing them of collusion to inflate energy prices. She’s planning to drop that suit if this plan passes.

I’ll have more analysis of this later after I have a chance to look at some information I received from Ameren today.

AmerenCILCO

Electric rates not nearly high enough yet for greedy Ameren

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Ameren LogoDespite the fact that Ameren’s webpage boasts “To Our Illinois Customers: We have listened to you and are ready to provide immediate rate relief,” the Journal Star reports today that rates are going up still more during June, July, August and September:

“No one likes to pay more for any product or service, but the rising costs of electricity have made higher rates a necessity,” Stan Ogden, Ameren Illinois’ director of customer service, said in a news release. “We have been able to structure rates to minimize the impact of higher costs during the summer months.”

I guess that 76% jump in profits just wasn’t enough to sustain old Ameren over the summer months. Their costs are going up, and it’s going to eat into that $123 million profit they made during the first three months of the year. I just don’t know how they’ll manage to stay in business at that rate.

To prevent paying higher electric bills, make sure that your home does not have cracks and gaps where so the ac does not have to over work, you can use spray foam to properly insulate your home.

Fortunately, they’ve worked to “minimize the impact of higher costs.” How thoughtful. Mr. Ogden and his bosses can console themselves with that thought every time an elderly person on a fixed income dies this summer because they can’t afford to run their air conditioners.

Do the greedy monopolists at Ameren really think they’re fooling anybody? Luckily, homeowners can switch to Regional Energy for lower electricity rates Calgary.

Update: First, it has come to my attention that my understanding of the rate increase is not accurate. The way I read the newspaper article, it sounded like they were talking about an additional rate increase for the summer months on top of the increase that took effect January 1. Not true. In fact, the increase is rather in reference to how much higher the summer rates will be relative to last year.

Secondly, for the record, I just want to express that I don’t really think Ameren is trying to kill old people — that was hyperbole. I felt that was obvious, but I’ve been told that Ameren employees take comments like that personally. So, if any Ameren employees thought I was accusing them of negligent homicide, my apologies. I guess some people take my blog way more seriously than I thought. I suppose that’s a good thing. It could mean that people are reading the Chronicle and have high expectations for it. I’ll go with that explanation. 🙂

AmerenCILCO, Peoria Public Schools

For at-risk students, 0.87 acres will do

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Former SSA Building on Knoxville

UPDATED 3/31/07 10:45 p.m. Added info underlined, deleted items struck.

School District 150 officials met with parents residents on Monday night (3/26) to share information on their plans for the old Social Security Administration building at 2628 N. Knoxville Ave. While some parents residents were taken by surprise, this has been in the works for a couple of years.

District applied for building in 2005

On June 4, 2005, Clare Jellick reported in the Peoria Journal Star, “the Social Security Administration moved out of its Knoxville building in November to a new location in North Peoria. Once a building is vacated, the federal government offers it to the local government for certain uses and groups that serve the homeless, usually for free.” She added later in the article:

In order for the district to get the building for free, it would have to be used for educational purposes. This means it couldn’t be turned into offices.

Interim Superintendent Cindy Fischer hopes to move an alternative education program there so that it can expand.

The Transition to Success Academy, housed in White Middle School [it was later moved to the Manual High School building], provides specialized education and services for students with behavioral problems who aren’t succeeding in school.

This came out just a couple of months after I started blogging, so here’s my initial reaction to that story. Today, I feel the same way. The district’s Master Facilities Plan calls for a reduction in the number of buildings, not an expansion. Why not put these kids in the old Blaine-Sumner building? It’s in a better location and was designed to be a school. Yet the district has turned that building into offices, and they’ve acquired an office building to convert it to a school. As usual, there is no logic.

District acquired building in 2006 with strings attached

On June 24, 2006, the Jellick reported that District 150 had succeeded in “receiving the building for free through a federal program that offers surplus buildings to certain organizations.” Again, the planned purpose for the building was made clear at that time:

The district intends to use the 9,000-square-foot space next school year to house programs and services for at-risk students who aren’t succeeding in school. The building will likely serve kids in kindergarten through sixth grade, said district associate superintendent Cindy Fischer….

The federal government says District 150 must use the building for education purposes for the next 30 years and cannot sell it during that time. Once 30 years pass, the district can do whatever it wants with the building, [U.S. Dept. of Education realty specialist Mary] Huges said.

District meets with parents residents to share plans in 2007

District 150 parent and nearby resident Karen Carter attended Monday’s meeting on the district’s current plans and had this to report:

The plan is to put an alternative school that will host grades 5-8 and possibly even 2nd, 3rd, and 4th graders…. They are currently at Manual High School in an unused wing. They currently have 43 students with 8 staff members. In the new facility they will “hopefully” have 100 students with 1-2 staff members per every 10-12 students….

They plan to bus most of the kids in and the bus location is horrible. They have no consideration for traffic and other cars that park on the street. They want the kids to be picked up and dropped off on Gift next to the building and then enter the building on Knoxville. The street is not wide enough to accommodate their plans and everyone is saying so.

Most surprising to me is that the lot is only 300 ft. by 127 ft., or 38,100 ft.², or 0.87 acres. I thought grade schools had to have at least 10 acres, plus one acre for every 100 students. I thought kids had to have green space immediately adjacent to the school building for it to be an adequate learning environment. I thought our kids deserved “the best” and not merely “good enough.” Isn’t that the basis upon which the school board decided to reject all proposals to keep Glen Oak School in its current location? How are kids ever going to be able to observe a bee so they can draw it correctly?

Once again, the school board exhibits bald-faced hypocrisy. For the Glen Oak replacement school, they need 15 acres of green space or we’re practically abusing the students. For the alternative school students — students who are most at-risk — an 0.87-acre site with no green space on one of the busiest arterial roadways in Peoria is perfectly acceptable:

Old SSA Building on Knoxville

It appears from federal regulations that the school district is committed to using this building for educational purposes for 30 years. So while the district has all kinds of money to convert classrooms to offices and offices to classrooms, there’s no money to upgrade classrooms at Glen Oak School. Just more of the same lunacy we’ve come to expect from District 150.

AmerenCILCO, Illinois Commerce Commission

ICC demands explanation from Ameren

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Ameren LogoThere’s been a lot of press coverage of Ameren’s threats since their bond rating was reduced to junk status by Moody’s Investors Service and the response by the Illinois Commerce Commission (ICC). I’ve seen a lot of quotes from the ICC’s letter, but not the letter in its entirety. It is available online. You can read it by clicking the “Show More” link below, or see a scan of the actual letter on the ICC’s website in PDF format.

I’m glad the ICC is looking into this matter. It certainly appears that Ameren is playing games, and power is nothing to play games with. In today’s society we depend on electricity and gas for heat, cooling, cooking, and other vital needs. Especially gratifying were the parts of the letter that said the ICC expects Ameren to “suspend their common and preferred dividends” and “consider reductions in . . . executive compensation and promotional advertising” before cutting services.

It looks like, in their zeal to stave off attempts by the legislature to reimpose a rate freeze, Ameren went a bit overboard in their dire warnings of what might happen if their credit rating were to suffer. Apparently they didn’t anticipated the ICC would call them on it. The irony is that, in their attempt to rebuff rate regulation, they’re unintentionally making a case for it instead.

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Aaron Schock, AmerenCILCO, Energy Issues, State Legislation

Maybe this is why Schock and other Republicans aren’t signing on to HB 5766

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A bill in the Illinois General Assembly, HB5766, would extend the current electricity rate freeze three more years (providing relief for Illinois families) and is supported by the Citizens Utility Board. However, our representative in the 92nd district, Aaron Schock, isn’t signed on as a co-sponsor, nor is any other Republican.

I’d like to say I remembered to follow the money immediately, but to be honest, it wasn’t until challenged by a commenter on Billy’s blog that I actually checked Schock’s campaign contribution record.

According to his Jul-Dec 2005 and Jan-Jun 2006 D-2 Semi-annual campaign contribution reports, Schock received:

  • $1,300 from AMEREN Illinois PAC ($1,000 in 2006 and $300 in 2005)
  • $1,250 from MidAmerican Engergy Holdings, which provides power to the Quad Cities ($1,000 in 2006 and $250 in 2005)
  • $800 from Exelon PAC; Exelon owns Commonwealth Edison, which provides power to Chicago ($500 in 2006 and $300 in 2005)
  • $500 from the Illinois Energy Association ($250 in 2006 and $250 in 2005)

That’s a pretty good chunk of change. I imagine he’s probably going to vote against HB 5766.

AmerenCILCO, Energy Issues, State Legislation

Price freeze hasn’t hurt Ameren’s profits

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The Citizens Utility Board (CUB) has compiled some interesting data on Ameren. Starting in 1997, the year electricity rates were frozen by the state, they graph Ameren’s profits every other proceeding year, right up to 2005. One would expect profits to be modest at best, given the handicap of a rate freeze. But check this out:

Ameren Profits from CUB

Doesn’t look like the price freeze negatively affected their ability to nearly double their profits over the past ten years. So, it appears Ameren doesn’t really need that 55% increase, does it? It would be fair for someone to retort, “Why shouldn’t they be allowed to raise their rates 55%? Let the free market decide!”

Ah, but therein lies the problem. Ameren is still a monopoly in residential services. If you don’t like the Ameren rate hike and decide to go with their competition… you can’t, because there is no competition. Thus, consumers do deserve protection from price gouging — and a good case can be made that this is, in fact, price gouging.

There are those who are trying to help. CUB has “filed a brief with the appellate court, arguing the [rate hike] plan is illegal and hits consumers with unfair market prices at a time when the power companies still hold a monopoly on residential services,” according to today’s Journal Star. And Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan is trying to get the results of the recent reverse auction thrown out on the same basis.

CUB also reports, “Under the Electric Consumer Protection Act, HB 5766, rates would be frozen for another three years or until at least 33 percent of residential customers have switched electric suppliers.” So, it looks like there’s a possibility that 55% rate hike may not take effect in January after all.

AmerenCILCO, Energy Issues

Electric Shock: Homesteading not so crazy-sounding now

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Electric ShockAfter budget-busting increases in natural gas last winter, now we get to see the other half of our CILCO bills go through the roof. AmerenCILCO announced yesterday that electric rates will rise 55 percent starting in January 2007. Pioneer-life doesn’t seem as far-fetched all of a sudden.

I remember reading about the Howerter family in a Journal Star series on homesteading. They were living “off the grid” — that is, without any electricity they couldn’t generate for themselves. It was a hard life, not unlike the ones the pioneers lived when they came to this area. You just don’t realize how much time and energy is saved by our modern appliances. I admired their idealism, but thought it was crazy to try such a thing.

Until now.

Oh, I’m not moving my family into a rural log cabin and becoming a modern day Ingalls homestead. But I am considering things I never thought I would even explore: ways to get off the grid. Right now I’m looking at the feasibility of solar power and ways to conserve energy in our house. There are surprisingly (to me) a huge number of resources on the internet on ways to conserve and generate one’s own electricity.

I was just reading an article in Home Power Magazine about a family who installed a solar electricity system, also called “PV,” short for “photovoltaics.” Even with this system and all their conservation efforts in place, they still couldn’t produce enough electricity to get completely off the grid, especially in the winter months when there obviously is very little sun and a lot of furnace blower energy being used. But in the summer months, they came very close to producing 100% of their electricity needs. So, that tells me it’s at least worth exploring. For concerns like these, it’s better to visit sites like https://allheatingservices.com/furnace-repair/ and consult professionals.

We’ve got to do something. We simply can’t afford a 55% increase in our current CILCO bills.