In October, most Acton electricity customers will see increases in prices. What follows in this article is information on the source of those changes, information on how to weather the storm of spiking electricity prices, and the good news about renewable energy.
What Is Acton Power Choice?
Acton Power Choice (APC) is the Town-administered, bulk electricity purchasing program. APC is one part of the Town’s strategy to decrease greenhouse gas emissions associated with Acton’s energy use. The program began in 2017, and will soon enter into its third fixed-price contract period with an electricity “aggregator,” or supplier. Although the electricity supply for APC comes via the contracted supplier, Eversource always generates monthly bills, manages electricity infrastructure, and is responsible for problems (e.g., power outages).
Am I in the APC Program?
Most households in Acton are enrolled in Acton Power Choice. To see if you are, look on your Eversource electricity bill (at the bottom of the “Current Charges for Electricity” section on the first page). If you see “Billing for TOWN OF ACTON,” you are participating in the Acton Power Choice program. Created by Town Meeting vote in 2017, APC creates options for electricity sourcing that lets people choose how much renewable energy they want in their electricity supply. This is done via Town contracts with electricity suppliers that, so far, have allowed people to pay less for electricity over the life of an APC contract than they would had they switched back to the Eversource Basic rate. The program is explained in great detail at ActonPowerChoice.com.
How Prices Are Changing
APC is soon transitioning from the current three-year contract (with Constellation NewEnergy) to a new, 15-month contract with NextEra Energy Services. Historically, APC rates (which are locked in for the length of a given contract) have been quite favorable compared with the general energy marketplace; with the new contract, prices for APC electricity supply are shifting to reflect the increased costs in the marketplace. Figure 1 shows the prices that were fixed (via the current contract) from Sept. 2019 to Sept. 2022, and the new prices for the next contract (effective Sept. 2022 to Dec. 2023) that will show up in Oct. 2022 electricity bills.
Figure 1
Acton Power Choice customers have three options to choose from:
- Basic — this matches the percentage of high-quality, Northeast-sourced renewable energy (Class I Renewable Energy Certificates, aka RECs) required by the state from every electricity supplier, including Eversource. That requirement rose from 14% to 20% during the 2019–2022 contract period, and will rise from 20% to 22% during the 2022–2023 contract period.
- Green — this offers 100% Class I REC renewable electricity from regional sources
- Standard — this is the “auto-enrollment”/default offering into which customers are subscribed initially; in the current contract, Standard provides 10% more than the required percent of class I RECs; that will increase to 40% over the minimum requirement starting in September
You can find out (or confirm) which APC option you are enrolled in by looking at a recent Eversource bill. On the second page, under “Total Charges for Electricity,” find the “Generation Service Charge” line, and to the right, you’ll see the per-kilowatt-hour (kWh) price. Translate that to cents by moving the decimal point two places to the right, e.g., .10985 becomes 10.985¢.) Then, match up that price with those on the chart above. (The rates on your bill are in dollars, and our chart uses cents). If a recent bill shows a price of .10985, you are in the Standard option; if you see .10741, you are in Basic; if your price is .12671, you are in Green.
Wholesale Electricity Prices Up Dramatically Nearly Everywhere
Electricity prices everywhere have risen quickly in the last few months. The New England grid relies heavily on methane (“natural”) gas to generate electricity. Global methane prices have ticked up sharply, mostly because of uncertainties around the supply of methane from Russia. You can see this in the pattern of Eversource Basic pricing for electricity supply:
Figure 2
Eversource prices usually go down in the second half of each year, but this year they went up. Eversource Basic prices — which rose by more than 13% from the first half of 2022 to the second half — are expected to go up again in the first half of 2023. When Acton went out to bid for the next contract for Acton Power Choice (beginning Sept. 2022), the prices quoted showed the same sharp rise. Acton decided to choose a short-term contract (15 months) so that if prices fall in late 2023 (as analysts are predicting), we could lock in lower rates for the next contract period. This new contract does provide 15 months of protection from further marketplace price increases in the short-to-medium term. The Town was able to keep the APC Basic price (17.766¢) below the Eversource basic price (17.871¢).
Note: the Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities requires mention that “future savings compared with Eversource Basic service cannot be guaranteed.”
Renewable Energy Prices Also Higher
The premium paid for Class I RECs has also risen a bit from one APC contract to the next. In the 2019–2022 contract, it cost just under 0.025¢ for each extra percent of renewable energy. In the 2022–2023 contract it costs 0.035¢ for that same extra percent. You can see this (in Figure 1) by noting that the slope of the purple line (showing the 2022–2023 costs) is slightly steeper than the green line (which shows 2019–2022 costs). This trend is about to change, as both the new federal and state climate laws kick in to increase renewable supply and reduce prices.
How to Reduce Financial Impacts of These Changes
There is good news: most APC customers (who are in Standard) are about to get significantly more renewable electricity in their supply. Thus, Acton will be reducing the greenhouse gas impact of its electricity use by a lot. However, because of the higher prices in this contract period, some households may need to do what they can to reduce their electricity costs, even if they do care about reducing carbon emissions. Here are three ways to reduce costs:
- Switch to APC Basic for a bit: The easiest way is to change into the APC Basic program for some or all of the upcoming contract period. That will provide lower electricity prices than you could get with Eversource Basic. (Or if you are subscribed to APC Green and need to rein in costs for the short term, you might switch temporarily to APC Standard.) When the next contract prices are announced, in late Fall 2023, you can consider switching back to Standard or Green. You can change your APC option at any time, for free. Changes made now will take about two billing cycles to take effect. To change your option within APC, you can fill out a form at https://www.masspowerchoice.com/acton/options-pricing/change-your-option or call 1-844-379-9933.
- MassSave can reduce your electricity bills: There are low-cost ways of reducing your electricity use. The MassSave program will provide a free home energy audit every two years, and will offer up-to-date recommendations, including appliance changes, lighting changes, or energy-loss reduction techniques, such as improved insulation or air sealing. And most of these opportunities come with substantial subsidies from MassSave! Learn more at https://www.masssave.com/
- Get the discounted electricity rate from Eversource: electric utilities are mandated by Massachusetts to provide discounted rates to electricity customers who receive any of a long list of income-tested financial benefits, including MassHealth, SSI, Head Start, subsidized school meals, or any of a number of Veterans’ support programs. You can learn more at https://www.eversource.com/content/ema-c/residential/account-billing/payment-assistance/discount-rate
- Conserve electricity as much as possible. Using less electricity is another way to limit the price impacts. Everyone’s mom or dad was right: turn off lights when they’re not necessary; use energy-efficient appliances; and put electronics and small appliances on a strip/bar that can be turned off at day’s end to avoid “ghost/phantom” electricity use. (See more on that last here.)
- Go Solar! For some households, this may be the right time to consider adding solar panels to generate electricity, instead of paying a supplier for all of your electricity. There are some great expanded incentives coming from both the new federal Inflation Reduction Act and the new Massachusetts law, “An Act Driving Clean Energy and Offshore Wind.”
Current participants in Acton Power Choice will be automatically enrolled in the new, NextEra Energy Services contract with their September meter read and do not need to take any action. Participants will first see the new prices on their October 2022 Eversource electricity bills, and will see the electricity supplier listed on the bill change to “NES – Acton Power Choice.” APC prices impact only the supply portion of participants’ Eversource electricity bills; Eversource’s delivery charges are not affected by participation in Acton Power Choice.
These changes have been confusing and frustrating for many electricity customers. But there are significant reasons to believe that these price increases may be a relatively short-term phenomenon. Among them are (1) as noted, new energy and climate legislation at the state and federal levels will have impact over the coming few years; (2) analysts predict a calming in prices and volatility by late 2023; and (3) several offshore wind projects are slated to bring renewable electricity to the Massachusetts (and New England) grid beginning in 2023, which should relieve some of the price pressure on the renewables front.
The power of APC — through all of its subscribers — to reduce Acton’s greenhouse gas emissions is considerable, and is brought home by this: from the start of the APC program in 2017 through June 2022, we have avoided 24,366,609 pounds of CO2 — more than gas-powered passenger cars driving 27+ million miles!
Green Acton recognizes that the coming price increases may have an impact on some households’ ability to remain in the Standard (or Green) option, and that this will mean a loss of some of the emissions-reduction impact of the program. But we are hopeful that this will be a short-term setback, both for budgets and for the climate. We hope that Acton residents and businesses can find ways (see strategies above), as they are able, to ride out these recent and short-term price increases and hang with the APC program — even if it means opting down to Basic for some months or for all of the 2022–2023 contract period.
We also hope that each household or business owner will, in making decisions about their APC options, appreciate and consider the “big picture” — both the importance to our shared future of reducing emissions rapidly, and that Acton is taking big steps forward, in the longer term, by reducing the greenhouse gas emissions that are the primary cause of global climate change. APC is a critical part of that effort, which means that each household and business in APC is an important player in achieving climate goals. Thank you for doing your part!
If you have questions about any of this, please leave a comment on this article, or contact us at info@greenacton.org.
