BELLEVUE, Wash. -- Last month’s snow and ice storm didn’t just leave hundreds of thousands of customers in the dark; it wreaked havoc on Puget Sound Energy’s power system. The tab for bringing in crews and making repairs is still being tallied, but could easily be in the tens of millions of dollars. And who will pay? Customers—in the form of rate increases.
“When there’s a storm, it’s something all customers pay for. You pay for electricity and the ability to fix what’s broken and that’s reflected in all our bills, “ said Andy Wappler, Vice President of Corporate Affairs for Puget Sound Energy.
Many customers probably don’t realize that they’re still paying for the last big storm—the Hanukkah Eve Storm of 2006 cost PSE more than $90 million in repairs. Despite being fined for their poor response, PSE still got a rate increase which customers will be paying until 2017. The utility is collecting about $663,000 per month from customers. That’s about 34 cents per month from the average residential customer.
Bellevue resident Norm Hansen doesn’t like the way PSE passes along storm costs to customers.
Last June, Puget Sound Energy requested a separate rate increase, unrelated to storms, of 8.1 percent for electricity, $5.78 for the average residential customer and a 3.6 percent increase for gas, an average of $2.95 per month. The Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission has the authority to approve that request or modify it. The Commission held a hearing in Bellevue Wednesday night to hear what customers had to say.
Lisa Clark of Oak Harbor is one customer who opposes the increase.
“Be realistic, we can’t go in and say I’d like an 8 percent raise. I don’t think it’s reasonable for us to take that [increase] on,” said Clark.
Puget Sound Energy promised improvements after the 2006 storm in which 70 percent of its 1 million customers lost power. PSE conceded it needed to get crews to downed lines more quickly and give customers a better idea of how long they would remain in the dark.
Wappler said that PSE did a much better job this time. About 40 percent of PSE customers lost power in last month’s storm. But many did not get power back for days. Wappler said the storm lasted 8 days and was difficult to manage because it started with snow, followed by wind, ice, and then more wind.
Puget Sound Energy doesn’t just have a problem getting power restored after big storms. A review of PSE’s own Service Quality Report Cards from 2006-2010, shows that the utility failed to reach its own target four out of five times. PSE said that data was not yet available for 2011.
Puget Sound Energy is the state’s largest and oldest energy utility, with a 6,000 square mile service area covering parts of six counties.
Customers are just hoping the wallop of last month won’t be repeated because winter isn’t over yet.
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