ORDER-2015-109 : Authorization of Municipal Aggregation Plan for Electric Service

Transcript (~49 min @ 4:50)

Speakers identified by voice; unnamed voices are numbered within this recording. Auto-caption text — verify against the video.

▶ 4:46 Peter D. Mortimer: The first order we have before us this evening is order 2015-109. is the authorization of municipal aggregation plan for electric service. It's been assigned to this committee for discussion, and it is before us now. May we have a motion to suspend the rules to hear from the Mayor and Mrs. Grover and their coterie of supporters who are here tonight. Alderman Byrd has made a motion to suspend the rules. It is duly seconded by Alderman McAteer-Margolis. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. opposed hearing none the motions are suspended we have Martha Grover our energy guru for the city of Melrose doing a wonderful job over the past few years and we have the Honorable Robert J Dolan mayor of the city of Melrose would you like to make an opening statement yes thank you members of the

▶ 5:40 Speaker 3: board and thank you for your work on behalf of the city this tonight is the culmination of over a year of work and the first question is why are we here and why is this important it's not a the normal order sent before the Board of Aldermen well there's a November of reasons we have members of our Energy Commission here the new member that was not able to speak as David Shakespeare is here Patrick Roach from MAPC clean energy is here as well as representatives from from good energy the creation of the Energy Commission by this board as well as the creation of a separate department within the planning office has three roles one is to provide the most up-to-date use of technology and environmental science as well as a good practice to help the city in the schools lower energy costs one of the fixed what are the costs that we have that is must be controlled if we do not control them it will certainly affect direct services for residents the second is information information to the public as well as businesses on how they too can lower their cost the third is to provide support which is developed from this group real practical ways for our houses of worship our business community and our citizens to put those ideas in that information to into action we have seen it in Melrose which is now signed on I think are how many solar 125 individual houses in the city was solar in my own home like many others using the mass save program for dramatically reduced cost for insulation as well as zero percent loans for upgrading of heating systems conversion from oil to gas the use of electric cars in the city and a November of other measures that can actually help people save money in very in very few times a government can actually help people save money this is a important piece of ordinance legislation or at least to allow us to to proceed forward because as you know energy costs particularly electric has

▶ 8:04 Speaker 3: skyrocketed over the last year it was petitioned and approved of a 39 37 percent increase in electrical costs that everyone everyone has been feeling now how can we help in May the board granted approval for our green energy coordinated to pursue the concept of municipal aggregation in November with assistance from MAPC which has been an incredible partner Martha and her committee selected a broker good energy good energy has put together a plan for which we seek your approval tonight if you're approved if you approve the plan we will move forward and put out to bid to supply electricity for the city of Melrose we think the city is in a great position with the assistance of an experienced broker to go out to bid you get a good deal for Melrose residents and small businesses. We feel confident that we can save the residents of Melrose somewhere between $100 and $200 a year on their electrical bills. We expect that we will reduce the yearly cost of electricity for Melrose residents and Melrose businesses. Fifteen percent of the electricity provided in this program will be from green sources such as wind power. Five percent of the electricity will be from local sources. This is important for two reasons. it stabilizes the cost of electricity providing budget predictability for individual households in the same way that the city has predictably has predicted its own energy budget and has stabilized those those budgets it supports green energy in our region we have selected a broker with a lot of experience in public outreach they can do an education outreach that we feel is necessary and responsible and protects consumers this is a voluntary program as are all our programs a voluntary program backed by the research of this community as well as others that involve themselves in this process and we can save residents dollars in a cost that is only going to escalate I think it's I think it's the right thing to do we've seen countless examples in the community of Melrose of people taking on good practices even last week we were at the first congregational church was the first house of worship to put in solar these are our measures that will provide some sustainability for our businesses for our local for our local houses of worship as well as our community and I think the good work of this community committee should be recognized and I think it should be supported and I think it will help the residents of the city control electrical costs in a responsible manner in a less pressure situation as many of the people are getting phone calls and letters daily from these people that might not might not have the experience and in some cases might not be doing the right thing that's why I ask for your support Thank

▶ 10:50 Peter D. Mortimer: You Mayor Dolan Ms. Grover would you like to add a few words I'd just like to

▶ 10:59 Speaker 4: say thank you and I'd like to introduce brokers that we've been working with

▶ 11:09 Speaker 4: gentlemen would you come up please and we have a short presentation that we'd like to give and then we can answer any questions that anybody has so just

▶ 11:21 Speaker 4: just to take you back to may I came to you then and provided some basic information about aggregation and how it works the the term that's used is municipal aggregation but we've coined community electricity aggregation which I think better explains what we're doing it's the communities aggregating it so

▶ 11:48 Speaker 4: So at the top of that slide is the order that's before you, which is that where we are tonight is we've got a plan, a proposed plan that we would like to submit to the Department of Public Utilities. So as DPU and the Attorney General ask and require that we get approval from the Board of Aldermen in order to submit it, so that's the point that we're at tonight. we'll go over I'll just do a little basic about the part of the electric bill that we're talking about where aggregation is in Massachusetts today the experience of good energy in this field the process as it as it lays out

▶ 12:29 Speaker 4: from from today and then specifics of the plan the key elements to it the product offerings that we're proposing the opt-out process which is very important the overall timeline and then again questions so just to draw your

▶ 12:44 Speaker 4: attention to an electric bill which is confusing for a lot of people to look at but what we're talking about is in the second page it's the supply services so national grid would still be the deliver the delivery service still provide you know outage services and they would be the person that residents and businesses would call with problems but we're talking about going out to bid in choosing a supplier and that if you can look at it closely that's the rate that It just recently went up to $0.16, which is in comparison to $0.10 last winter.

▶ 13:35 Speaker 4: I think what I'll do at this point is pass it on to you guys to talk further. This is Philip Carr and John O'Rourke of Good Energy Air Brokers.

▶ 13:49 Speaker 5: Mr. Chairman and elected officials, thank you very much for your time and attention to this very important issue so just to give you some context John and I will both go through this fairly quickly because the questions are often the most important part of this we understand that but just to give you a sense of the context of where we're at with aggregation aggregation really is all about taking control of your own destiny as it relates to energy purchasing okay so what's happening right now is that the way that national grid is flowing power through to you and your citizens in this community is that they purchase twice a year the same time each year regardless of market conditions for a short term period okay with municipal aggregation you can purchase when the market is favorable for as long as you want okay so are you the first community be doing this in the state absolutely not so what you can see on the on the chart there is the Cape Light compact that's been going for about a decade now they've been purchasing their own power we go to the next slide you can see

▶ 15:12 Speaker 5: those active municipal aggregations that went out individually to do their own programs the Cape Light compact formed its own group per se so you can see a variety of programs and most of those orange diamonds have come online in the last two years okay next slide please now interestingly also what you're

▶ 15:40 Speaker 5: seeing there are municipal lighting plants communities that are not with National Grid or n star ever source but they are in essence apart from the fact

▶ 15:57 Speaker 5: that they are in control of their own lines and we can't emphasize enough that with a municipal aggregation program if you have an outage you call National Grid they're gonna fix your lines exactly the same as they always have done we always say you will get the same quality of service okay whatever that quality of service was before you'll get after okay so they'll fix your lines the same you're still gonna get one bill from National Grid but if you look all those municipal light plants they all essentially purchase their own power so the tradition of purchasing power for your community is very strong in the Commonwealth next slide please and then you can see the communities that good Energy has. We buy power for about 2 million residents in this country. We are the industry leader in this. We entered the market in Massachusetts in January last year, and we have won the business of 15 communities, about 150,000 households, and we're growing very fast. So That is an indication, partly our experience, but partly the reason why we came into this market is that many, many communities are doing this right now. And many communities in the Boston metropolitan area are looking at this very closely.

▶ 17:25 Speaker 5: So recently Martha hosted a luncheon, a very important luncheon, which also had Patrick Roche from MAPC in attendance, and also the Mass Energy Consumers Alliance, which is the preeminent standard for local renewable energy, possibly in the country, certainly in the Commonwealth. And in attendance, we had leading representatives from Cambridge, Newton, Somerville, Brookline, Dedham, Medford, and Nantucket. Nantucket was an outlier. but we had a very very strong representation so you can get a sense of the momentum so to make you feel like you're not on your own doing this okay there's a lot of other communities that have done this and are in the process of doing this okay next slide please John you want to take it from here sure

▶ 18:22 Speaker 6: Thank You Philip again the process that this goes through is a very strict and comprehensive process it goes through a Department of Energy Resources review and consultation and it goes through a an approval process by the Department of Public Utilities to take these steps just individually the review and acceptance of the aggregation documents by the Board of Aldermen is just part of process and basically it says to DOER and DPU that you've looked at the documents you've reviewed them and you want to file them to to go forward with

▶ 19:08 Speaker 6: aggregation the aggregation documents are made available for public review and essentially all that means is that you offer your citizens the the opportunity to look over the documents obviously not many of them are going to understand the language of these documents but you give them the opportunity to look and to

▶ 19:35 Speaker 6: make comments once that can go in parallel with the the review and consultation process of the Department of Energy Resources they basically go over the plan initially and give technical assistance if there's something in the plan that they don't think will will be to the liking of DPU one of the things that we have done we have met several times with the Department of Energy Resources and the Department of Public Utilities they have encouraged that when we submit a plan we take documents from plans that have already been approved all of the documents in this plan have been taken from approved documents so they want to be able to say okay we've seen this before we know what this is they don't want us to reinvent the real they just want us to give them documents that they have already seen and approved and that's what we've done with with this plan the aggregation documents once they go to the Department of Public Utilities the department has a public hearing they announce the public hearing they bring in anyone who wants to comment on the plan again another public review then they set up a procedural conference that includes the Department of Public Utilities the Department of Energy Energy Resources, the Attorney General, the local utility, and anyone else who has petitioned to intervene in the process. Normally there aren't too many outside interveners aside from those that I mentioned. What happens during those sessions, that procedural session, is that everybody gets to ask questions about the plan, about how it will be coordinated between the municipality, the local utility, and the competitive supplier once that competitive supplier is recognized and their bid is accepted.

▶ 21:58 Speaker 6: Once the approval of the plan is done by the Department of Public Utilities, we develop a competitive bid. We go out to the largest and best electricity suppliers in the country for their answers to our bids, and at this point in time, one of the only places that any of these big energy companies can expand because they've already taken up the commercial and industrial markets is the residential market. We have a November of them who have contacted us who are very interested in what we're doing here in Massachusetts.

▶ 22:41 Speaker 6: want to bid on our our plans once a competitive bid is accepted by the the mayor or his designee we start an opt-out process and again this process is very detailed we let everybody in the city know who is on the basic service with National Grid that the aggregation plan is in place they have a 30-day period under the law to opt out what we have done we have made we have extended this to the entire term of the contract whether that's one two or three years they can opt out at any time with no penalty if they if they choose to once Once the plan is in place and energy is flowing, good energy monitors the plan, manages the plan through the contract with the competitive supplier. And essentially that's the process. Again, it's a process that's very regulated. We're very experienced at what we do in managing these plans and make sure that what's happening in the city is the best for the residents and the businesses.

▶ 24:04 Speaker 6: There are several key elements of the aggregation plan. Again, under the law, there has to be universal access to the plan, basically meaning that anyone who wants to be in the plan can be in the plan. Reliability of service, again, a lot of that is dependent on the local utility and the service they provide on the power side we only deal again with the largest national suppliers who basically have the highest credit ratings and they are all reliable the next item is an equitable treatment within each rate class commercial industrial the different classes of residential everybody has to be treated equitably in those classes one of the most important important parts of this plan, and it can't be overemphasized, is the fact that you need good public outreach and education so that by the time you get to the opt-out period – there's a period before that when we will basically have public meetings, we will meet with community groups, the senior center groups, whoever wants to meet with us to ask about how this works. When the opt-out period comes, we want to make sure that all of your citizens basically know exactly what's going on here so there's no confusion and they understand the plan. They will understand that if for some reason they don't want to be in the plan, they can opt out. They will be notified with a letter that will say what the present rate is from the local utility, which national grid, and they'll be told what the rate is from the competitive supplier. And again, we're very sure that that will be substantially lower than your national grid rate. At that point in time, they can opt out by just signing a postcard and sending it back. And again, at any other time in the program, they can opt out.

▶ 26:19 Speaker 6: The last part of this program is the electricity service agreement, which the municipality signs with the competitive supplier that you have chosen to supply your electricity for a period of time, either one, two, three years, and whatever mix of green you want. now there's a special Melrose is leading the way here okay in the product that

▶ 26:56 Speaker 5: will be offered in in your plan and I'll turn that over to Martha sounds good so so what's what's unique and interesting is that Melrose has an opportunity here to do something that is relatively pioneering from the point of view that we at Good Energy are the national leaders in municipal aggregation, so we like to aspire to be the steady pair of hands on the tiller. We really know what we're doing. We do not, however, profess to be the best experts on local renewable energy in Massachusetts. So we went out and we found the experts, who is Mass Energy Consumers Alliance, and some people in this room tonight pay extra on their electric bill so that they know that 100 percent of their energy usage is being sourced from local renewable energy certificates. So what's exciting is that we at Good Energy have identified a way whereby residents and businesses in the city can partake in a local renewable energy product that will spur and stimulate demand for the growth of more renewable energy in the Commonwealth, but with a very small incremental increase on the bill. So what we're talking about, the foundation of this program, the foundation is economic savings. Let's be quite clear about that. Economic stability, budgetary stability. The opportunity that creates is that you can, for a very small increment, flow local renewable energy. So whereas the individual resident at the moment can elect to get a product from the Mass Energy Consumers Alliance, what we are proposing, and we've worked very hard to create this product, is instead of 100%, you're going to get 5% for all of your residents as the

▶ 29:16 Speaker 5: standard product in this program. And that is the beauty of municipal aggregation, is actually you can spread the cost of stimulating demand for local renewable energy at what is a meaningful level for a very small incremental increase on your bill. Okay, and that's what's exciting and that's what's new. And that is why the likes of Cambridge and other leading municipalities in the boston metropolitan area came here for lunch because they were fascinated by it okay so that's the new and exciting part and that's what we're pioneering here today let's be quite clear though it's all about universal access equitable treatment there will be an option if anybody wants to not to have any additional amount above the 10 mandated by the state uh you know you do not have to have the mass energy five percent you can elect to have i just want to have my as as it should be right as it was before okay um equally if someone wants to actually go look i'm happy to pay a bit more i want my 100 you can have that too those will be the two options all right but the standard product will be five percent okay and that that is a very exciting thing that is in some ways a game changer And what's exciting is it's totally possible and will be very successful, and we know that because we have run and do run the largest programs in the country. Okay? Okay.

▶ 30:49 Speaker 5: So, I think we've spoken a little bit about the opt-out process. John, you want to just clarify the details next? I know we're going to take up too much of your time.

▶ 30:57 Speaker 6: we mentioned the opt-out process earlier and there's a detailed page here for you to look at I'm not going to go over all the deep details the important part of this is that at any point in time someone can opt out of the program if they choose without penalty without escalations without any additional cost and and that gives that gives your residents a comfort level that is in the

▶ 31:29 Speaker 5: law all right I was gone the timeline here so so our goals are to have your your plans approved by September by the DPU we've been working very hard we've we've you know already met with the utilities actually through circumstance met the the the chief executive the big boss of National Grid literally just last week at a British American Chamber of Commerce event. I didn't speak about Murrow specifically, but we have very strong connections and the people at National Grid know that we know the senior people at National Grid, so they're working really hard for us, which is great. So we have been laying the groundwork to make sure that your plans will be approved quickly. We will be issuing the RFP in September. We expect October the winning bidder to be selected. The opt-out period will be going on through September, October, and in November, around the time that the rates will reset behind National Grid, residents and businesses should be enrolled on meet-or-read date. So the actual enrollment period takes about four to six weeks. Here's the thing. You're going to get some calls around the time of the opt-out period. It's going to happen. There's nothing we can do about it. I give up my mobile phone. We do everything we can to make sure that all calls are sent on to us or any emails you get from residents to send it straight on to us. Part of our marketing campaign, which will be very comprehensive in the four to six-week period before that opt-out period hits, will emphasize all the key points, all the information they need to know. but the key thing is we are there to answer questions put it on to us and that's that's basically it in a nutshell if you go the next slide please City of Melrose has a website which has some FAQs on an explanation the key thing to understand is when that opt-out letter goes out there will be an indicator that this is coming from the City of Melrose okay whether that's a seal of the city or it'll say it on the envelope so there's that distinction between the barrage of offers that you're getting right now. Okay?

▶ 33:51 Speaker 4: This website isn't live yet. Right. The link is not available.

▶ 33:54 Speaker 5: Yeah, we're just fine tuning that.

▶ 33:57 Speaker 4: Yeah, we will make it available as a source of information.

▶ 33:59 Speaker 5: Yeah, there's a sample notification letter which you can look at and a sample sort of opt out postcard. That may be fine tuned on the day but it gives you the essence and the principles of what these kind of things do look like. so this is a very exciting program it's um uh it's it's um it's going to be

▶ 34:25 Peter D. Mortimer: yeah we're good to go very good thank you very much for the presentation we appreciate it are there any alderman wishing to comment alderman boy cell please in your rate structure you've

▶ 34:37 Robert A. Boisselle: been talking about how the present utility has industrial commercial and residential within the residential category there are other subcategories where you have a lower rate doing it you have a low rate in the evening and a high rate during the day is that going to be covered also at the by this rating system all right now you're offering us a cheaper rate but they're offering us a rate and a cheaper rate so are you gonna have a cheaper rate and a sub cheaper rate for

▶ 35:14 Speaker 6: those people who are on that type of system all the rate classes currently enforced by national grid will be covered so you're gonna have two rates

▶ 35:23 Speaker 5: then it'll be one it'll be one fixed rate that will not change okay so the term length I probably should have outlined this is is going to be between a two and a three year term length okay so and here's the thing whereas your national grid rate resets every six months this rate will not change it'll one fixed rate which will stay fixed for two months so you're dissolving the

▶ 35:45 Robert A. Boisselle: lower rate that the individual gets in the evening we're not well are you

▶ 35:52 Speaker 6: talking about the the National Grid variable rate on that and some of the

▶ 35:57 Robert A. Boisselle: residential apartment complexes you have a rate for the day between 8 a.m. to 8 8 p.m. and from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m. you have a very lower rate all right now on

▶ 36:11 Speaker 6: the the apartment complexes those are not individual meters they're there it's one meter isn't it no for all its individual meters yeah okay well we'll look into that that particular situation okay you keep referring to local

▶ 36:27 Robert A. Boisselle: renewable energy and you're paying more to get more local renewable energy when you mention the term local energy renewable energy I'm looking for a turbine will say on on the Commons or near the pond over here where is your local renewable energy coming from is it coming from the wind farms in the Nantucket area which according to them they're paying the highest rate that's that's going to come from the utilities and so forth. Where's the local renewable energies?

▶ 37:01 Speaker 5: The Massachusetts Class 1 RECs, which means they are from, they're located in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Katie, if you want to help out with that, feel, feel, would it be possible to recognize someone tonight who's from? Yes. Sorry.

▶ 37:14 Peter D. Mortimer: Anybody would like, anybody else from your team where you'd like to come forward? Hi, this is Katie from Mass Energy. There's a microphone, please step forward.

▶ 37:22 Speaker 7: Hi, I'm a representative from Mass Energy Consumers Alliance, and we have a local portfolio of renewable energy certificates projects that we buy renewable energy certificates from to meet that additional 5% from Elrose. There's about 15 turbines in our portfolio, some of which are two of the three turbines.

▶ 37:44 Robert A. Boisselle: You're talking wind turbines now, not turbines? Wind turbines, yes, sir. Wind turbines? Yes. Okay, so these wind turbines are producing

▶ 37:55 Speaker 7: how much kilowatts each one is a has a different capacity but we signed contracts with the turbines to purchase the renewable energy certificates to meet the needs of the 5% additional aggregation for Melrose okay the other

▶ 38:18 Robert A. Boisselle: portion is come we'll say the fall of the winter once this is permitted everyone's going to be turned over to this particular program automatically

▶ 38:28 Speaker 5: there's no on with third-party supply yes sir everybody who's on the basic

▶ 38:31 Speaker 6: service of National Grid will be given a turn over for one month right onto the

▶ 38:37 Robert A. Boisselle: system yes and a little postcard is going to be the way of opting out which hopefully they kept that postcard when they received it to begin with so a lot of these people are just going to receive the package and probably read it or maybe just throw it away well so what happens to these people when they get their first bill indicating well geez who's this from I mean this this is not my carrier yeah so here's the way it works because we because

▶ 39:07 Speaker 5: these are 100 accurate concerns okay we've run programs I've personally overseen programs for about a million households okay as in like 500 000 households renewal okay so i i know exactly what happens here so you're absolutely right uh many people will not know what the envelope is in the

▶ 39:31 Robert A. Boisselle: opt-out letter and i can tell you right now the 200 or 300 page document you have there which yeah was introduced that no one's going to understand isn't going to go very far so so

▶ 39:40 Speaker 5: as far as far as the opt-out letter is concerned is is two things to understand one is uh we're going to do a marketing campaign okay and that marketing campaign is going to be very comprehensive we're going to meet with your press okay we're going to do events with any elected officials who would like to get involved with events we will go and meet with community groups now we all know that with the best marketing campaign in the world not everybody's going to get informed okay we will do a mailing to every single household additional to whatever mailing the winnings the opt-out letter is okay that will go out in advance we will do everything we can to ensure that when the opt-out letter arrives a sensible proportion of the population knows where it is okay additional that important to understand the concept that the opt-out period no one's enrolled until after the opt-out period right so the opt-out period lasts for 30 days that is merely a mechanism for buying power that's why you get this buying power is because the data is that between 85 and 95 percent will do nothing either through volition or through inertia right that's fact of life however people can leave this program at any time whenever they want so if someone suddenly realizes that they were switched and they hadn't been sensibilized by the marketing campaign they can stick up the hand and go I want out I wasn't informed even though we will done everything we can to inform them and they they can get out of the program whenever they want the key thing about this is no one is ever locked into do something they can't do. Okay?

▶ 41:28 Robert A. Boisselle: Okay. Moving on to my last question, showing the bill and so forth. On that particular bill, you have a line for the power and what you're paying for that electricity that you're using. Sure. But there are four or five other lines. Is that going to change in any way, or will the utility charge you extra for using the renewable line? Because right now, the utilities are in Congress because of the solar energy that they're forced to take in. but no one's repairing the power lines to carry that power back and forth so they're going to be charging the homeowner who has solar units if they're going into the grid they're going to be charged a fee to tap into that grid down the line is going to happen with that question what's going to happen down the

▶ 42:19 Robert A. Boisselle: line yeah one at a time please sorry well the renewable energy that we're

▶ 42:23 Speaker 4: for buying is included in the supply rate. It will be included in that one rate under the one line under supply on the bill, on your national-

▶ 42:33 Robert A. Boisselle: My only concern is, will the power company, because you're in a renewable rate from the turbines, the wind turbines and so forth, will they charge you an extra charge for that because you're using the grid not from their sources Not from their sources, but from a renewable source. The answer is no. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

▶ 42:59 Peter D. Mortimer: Thank you, Alderman Boycelle.

▶ 43:01 Gail Infurna: Point of information, I wonder if Martha could just move up to the mic more. I'm afraid that the people on TV won't be able to really hear anything that she has to say.

▶ 43:10 Peter D. Mortimer: Great, great idea. Thank you, Alderman Inferna. Next in queue, we have Alderman McAteer-Margolis, please.

▶ 43:18 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you all for coming and thank you for your hard work on this. I know it's been a long and arduous process and it's exciting to see it coming this far back to us. One of the questions I have is you've mentioned a couple of times about alerting the people who have the basic service with National Grid currently. So does that mean if people are opting in for 100% of renewable energy through National Grid, will they still be notified? that still considered like basic service yes if they're if they're on basic

▶ 43:59 Speaker 4: service now and those those are the customers who will be eligible for this program if they've if they're on a competitive supply contract right now with another supplier okay they won't be part of this they're gonna stay with that current contract but what we were referring to is that there you know a few hundred households who have opted for mass energy's green up product right it's what i'm

▶ 44:26 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: talking about they can be they can they will be part of this they will be notified as part of this if you have the extra like like i pay i think i don't have 100 but i think i have 50 right so that is still considered basic service 100 or 50 but the people who have already signed up with a different supplier will not have an opportunity to participate in this

▶ 44:49 Speaker 6: initially what happens is all of the notifications go out to those on basic service if someone isn't is on a competitive supplier we're not marketing to them if when their contract ends with that competitive supplier and they want

▶ 45:07 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: to come into the aggregation they can do so okay thank you and I think you have a good idea in terms of notifying people about the and informing the public and I'm sure you're you've done this in many places I I just wonder if you ever do any kind of electronic replies as opposed to mailing back a postcard if we can make use of the city's you know not reverse calling system or any other things like that or if you if you do allow people to respond you know via

▶ 45:44 Speaker 5: email or text message or whatever Skype you you know yeah I mean any any sort of any mechanisms you have for communicating with the citizens would be extremely valuable the opt-out letter per se is a bit sort of 20th century I'm afraid it's stuck there at the moment but but certainly anything like that which might help with it dissemination of information and getting people

▶ 46:08 Speaker 7: informed would be great so long as it's legally binding or whatever and and

▶ 46:11 Speaker 6: certainly after that initial period where the postcard is is the opt-out method they can telephone they can email whether it's us the competitive supplier or the local utility if they want to opt out okay and then I'm just going back to

▶ 46:24 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: the local renewable energy sir the so right now where national grids require to provide at least 10% and what you're going to be offering Melrose residents is basically 15% is that is that accurate it's temper it's 5% more percent

▶ 46:45 Speaker 4: is what's called the renewable portfolio standard right that goes up by 1% every year this year it's 10% okay and then we'll be the standard product will include an additional 5% of local renewable and that will be available to

▶ 46:57 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: to everybody at whatever the rate is that we're all gonna pay. Right. Okay. Then if people want to increase to 50% or 100%, that will also be available to them for a higher rate?

▶ 47:12 Speaker 4: 100% will be an option.

▶ 47:14 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: But not 50, okay. So it's either like 15% or 100%. And if it's 100%, is it all local renewable? It is. Yeah. Okay, great.

▶ 47:27 Mary Beth McAteer-Margolis: I think that's all that I have for right now and I think you have your work cut out for you with you know marketing this to the public but I think everyone is concerned about not only you know what's in their pocket at the end of the month but how we are you know getting our energy and I think I know with Miss Grover and her team and I'm sure your team that it will be a foremost part of marketing campaign so thank you thank you mr chairman thank you very much alderman mcateer

▶ 47:56 Peter D. Mortimer: margolis next we have president khan please yeah thank you i have a few questions um

▶ 48:06 Speaker 4: rather if you know what what percentage of the rate payers in the city are with competitive suppliers at the present time we have any idea we've requested that information from national grid but we haven't received it yet um rule of thumb is 15 to 20 percent are they compelled to give you that information if you ask them national grid yes you can do it by

▶ 48:31 Speaker 5: by a process of deduction knowing how many accounts uh total accounts we we will only get the data for those accounts that are on with the utility so we just need to subtract that from the

▶ 48:45 Speaker 4: the total data we can figure it out now in terms of the communities that have relationships with good energy in Massachusetts how do their their rates or costs compare with general national grid customers for current programs per

▶ 49:04 Speaker 5: se yes so we don't have any current programs in Massachusetts the reason we entered the market last year in January was we identified a dichotomy in the state whereby there is a shortfall of natural gas resulting in a highly volatile electric wholesale situation. I don't want to get too granular about this but long story short we didn't feel the opportunity was here until January last year we entered the market because we believe that until new it's a controversial issue but until that the electricity supply situation is stabilized that there will be highly volatile electric prices and one thing i really would emphasize here is we talk about big price increases okay i'm just telling you that these prices going to go like that over the next two or three years if you're not on one of these programs so maybe 16 cents now that could go back down to 10 okay but then it might go up to 16 again right thing is you just don't know you're dealing with a highly volatile situation what this product does is it will give you essentially a safe port in a storm because right now Massachusetts has an electricity purchasing a dilemma which is not going to be resolved for several years so we will be able to benchmark prices for you in September as to what our prices will be we have a track record of getting the lowest prices in given markets in the state of Illinois we I don't want to make you cry but they pay 3.8 cents per kilowatt hour needs to say a lot of coal in that state local generations coal and we got we got the lowest ever rate in that state we have a track record of getting the lowest rate And we're going to run the most competitive bid that has ever been run by a consultant in this state. We're talking to the CEOs of the largest power companies in the country who are going to bid on your business. So we're bringing, like, fundamentally massive market forces to bear and then tying that with some real local knowledge on renewable energy.

▶ 51:22 Speaker 4: So the communities that you have relationships with right now are not actually online? They haven't gone out to bid yet.

▶ 51:30 Speaker 5: So we have about, there'll be about 100,000 households, most of those are National Grid. They'll be going out to bid about the same time as you. You're in a slightly separate group to them.

▶ 51:40 Speaker 4: Now what about this Cape Light Communities Consortium? How do their rates compare to general National Grid customers, if you know?

▶ 51:50 Speaker 5: I mean, I'd say mixed bag, to be honest. you know they would I wouldn't we don't we would not advocate purchasing in the way that they purchase every consultant has their own way of operating so I think to look at other live programs might be might be misleading and what is

▶ 52:10 Speaker 4: the basis of our belief that our citizens are going to save 100 to 200

▶ 52:20 Speaker 5: dollars per year where we come up with that right so here's the thing I would estimate your residents are going to save 80 to 150 dollars a year okay this product works best when you go out when you purchase longer the longer you go probably the more money you're going to save quite simply the utility has to

▶ 52:45 Speaker 5: purchase on the specific days each year regardless of market conditions and we can purchase whenever we want and if we can't do better than the utility when we can purchase whenever we want we're not doing our job properly it's as simple as that so very important pointer these rates reset every six months that's either a challenge or an opportunity okay in many ways we see that as an opportunity. It shows that the purchasing is easier to beat in a way, because they purchase short term. So, John, you got any comments on ...

▶ 53:23 Speaker 6: Well, sir, you're ...

▶ 53:25 Peter D. Mortimer: Ladies and gentlemen, regrettably, under the rules of our Board of Aldermen and under the strictures of the open meeting law of Massachusetts another committee was posted to begin at 725 and so it now being 755 we must recess this committee start the protection license committee which will immediately open for public participation and then be recessed it should take about two minutes and the Finance Committee was set to start at 730 so that must open within 30 minutes its posted time they will open that committee open it for public participation and go right into recess the whole thing should take less than five minutes probably closer to three and then we can go right back to this hearing on the appropriations committee so from this committee i would welcome a motion to recess a motion to recess by alderman Boisselle duly seconded by alderman Forbes all in favor please say aye any opposed hearing none the committee on appropriations is now in recess thank you