WPCNR THE POWER NEWS. By John F. Bailey. September 13, 2008 UPDATED 1:40 P.M. EDT With Easy-to-Read, Comprehensive Charting:  As exclusively reported by WPCNR News and White Plains Week the last six months, Con Edison bills for White Plains consumers escalated  67% since November, and 39% of that increase coming over the 2008 June July and August period.

Con Edison,  told WPCNR exclusively on Thursday,  Westchester  residential consumers could expect their kilowatt hour charge to decline 25%in September, and be reflected in lower bills in October.  During the same three month period the cost of crude oil has declined 45%, but a price lag, presumably might be expected.

The cost per kwh has risen 67%  in White Plains since last November (2007)from 15.5 cents a kwh to 25 cents.  Con Edison explains this as being directly related to a passing on of direct fuel costs charged them by their electric suppliers.  Source: Con Edison and WPCNR

In a perhaps not-unrelated development, New York Senator Charles Schumer is calling on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to investigate possible price fixing and escalation of supply costs by energy suppliers furnishing Con Edison and other power companies with power through the state power grid, contributing substantially, Schumer alleges, to the Con Edison rates, and the rates other power companies are being forced to charge consumers. (Con Edison, it should be clear, is not the object of Mr. Schumer's investigation.)

Schumer announced Friday he would meet with FERC next Wednesday to begin his probe of this year’s all-time high electric prices, and NYISO and FERC roles in regulating the delivery of power through the NYISO grid.

Bob McGee, a media spokesman for Con Edison told WPCNR exclusively Thursday that Con Edison’s average bill for Westchester customers using 450 kilowatt hours (if you have a two story home you are closer to 1,000 kwhs)  would decline 25% in September from its average high of 30.42 cents per kilowatt hour in August to the more manageable 23 cents per kwh, a predicted relief of 25%.

"As you can see, there has been a significant drop in the electricity supply cost in the September bills as compared to the August bills," McGee said.

For the White Plains resident, who paid 25 cents per kwh in August, your rate would decline to approximately 19 cents if you apply Mr. McGee’s prediction of 25% to the current White Plains August rate of 25 cents/kwh.  Mr. McGee explained the average Westchester resident’s kwh price of 30.42 cents a kilowatt hour was due to other communities in the county paying more taxes on their Con Edison bill than White Plains does.

Con Edison Rate Relief Lags Behind Crude Oil Drop.

The Con Edison rate relief is proceeding at a slower pace than the three month decline in the world spot price of Crude Oil – blamed by Con Edison for its 65% increase in kilowatt hour rates since November. The bill for the White Plains customer using about 1,000 kilowatt hours a month has exploded 65% from  8 cents per kilowatt hour last November to 25 cents per kilowatt hour today – a 200% increase.

In that time the price of crude oil went from $90 a barrel on December 31, 2007  to $102 a barrel as of Thursday’s close, an increase of 13%. Of course crude oil ballooned to $145 a barrel about mid-June, but has since plummeted back to the $101-$102 a barrel benchmark.

Since the high oil mark of $145 a barrel in June, crude oil has declined 29%.

Meanwhile Con Edison raised the cost per kwh to White Plains customers 65% since January 1. Con Edison’s “drop” in pass-along costs, has not kept pace a  predicted 25%  cut resulting in White Plains customers still dealing with a 45% composite Con Edison rate hike – though to be fair -- there is a lag in the time it takes to for prices to catch up with each other and they never syncronize.

The Stealth Increase: 15.5 Cents to 18.3 in  08

WPCNR and White Plains Week first reported on the Con Edison ratcheting up of prices in March of this year noting that kilowatt hour Supply price had gone up in White Plains from 8.5 cents to 13 cents – (15.5 cents was the kwh rate in November of 2007). As of January 31, the White Plains residential customer was paying 18.3 cents a kwh.  In May it was up to 19 cents, July 21 cents, and in August the highest kwh hour price White Plains customers have ever paid per kwh – 25 cents. 

Westchester Averages from Con Edison

WPCNR was the only media to report this increase, and Con Edison did not draw customers' attention to the increase in their bill enclosures, as they did with last week's bill where customers  got the bad news of the 25 cent KWH rate in their September 5 bill.

The average County resident was paying more  than the White Plains resident in August -- 30.42 cents per kwh, according to Con Edison figures released to WPCNR Thursday. White Plains customers paid less (25 cents), due to lower tax rates in White Plains.

The Pass Along Blues

In the spring, WPCNR talked with Con Edison. Their press office reported that they are allowed to pass on increases in supply costs without approval by the New York Public Service Commission.  WPCNR asked Westchester County Department of Communications if the consumer Affairs bureau monitored these pass-along increases. WPCNR was informed the Consumer affairs bureau did not.

The New York Independent Services Operator which monitors spot electricity sales from which Con Edison purchases its electricity, told WPCNR that they did not monitor the different power companies manufacturing the electricity they sold as to whether the raw cost of refined fuels – oil, gas and coal – was being accurately and fairly added to the wholesale prices of electricity without being “marked up”. NYISO told WPCNR this was the jurisdiction of the Federal Energy   

No FERC spokesperson could explain to WPCNR how FERC actually assures fair and equitable pricing of power in relation to fuel costs. Apparently, Mr. Schumer wants to find out

Mr. McGee when asked why Con Edison’s 25% projecting did not match the 45% drop in the oil price said that Con Edison increased the price of Electric supply directly related to their costs:

Con Ed Not Being Investigated

WPCNR wants to make it clear that Mr.Schumer is not investigating Con Edison, rather Mr. Schumer, according to his news release, is investigating circuitous, costly routing of electricity on the power grid that articificially, he charges, raises the price of electricity to power companies like Con Edison.