Starting March, 2014, Bowling Green’s Board of Public Utilities [BPU] decided to "levelize"
[translation: "gradually raise"] residential electric rates 5 percent every year for the
foreseeable future.
Why the sudden rate increase?
In addition to the city’s usual known annual energy costs, something unexpected happened.
A surprise.
An investment in an Illinois coal plant didn’t work out as planned.
Bowling Green [through Peabody Energy and American Municipal Power AMP] contracted to purchase 50 percent
of the city’s energy from the Prairie State Coal Plant in Illinois.
For 50 years.
Prairie State plant came online in 2012.
Prairie State has had many problems since it came online.
Prairie State has not been successful.
High-sulphur coal from a nearby Peabody coal mine was difficult to process.
Overruns.
Shutdowns.
Management problems.
Prairie State incurred millions of dollars in debt.
Bowling Green’s "take or pay" contract says Bowling Green must pay for debts incurred by
Prairie State.
Bowling Green is already paying off debts of another AMP Ohio coal plant in Meigs County which had to be
shut down.
Peabody Energy Company sold 95 percent of its shares in the Prairie State plant.
An NBC news broadcast and articles in the Chicago Tribune and the Columbus Dispatch report that several
midwest communities are in the same fix.
They have been socked by rate increases due to heavy investment in Prairie State.
Some are finding ways to get out of the contract.
They have requested that Ohio’s Attorney General investigate the matter.
A federal commission [the SEC] is investigating the matter.
For the BPU to continue to deny that paying off the debts of these problematic coal plants did not figure
in any way whatever in the sudden 5 percent annual increase in electric rates is disingenuous. It’s OK,
BPU. We can deal with it. It’s nobody’s fault. Just a well-intentioned investment that seemed good in
2007 but didn’t work out. Just don’t euphemize it by calling it "levelization." Way too Aldous
Huxley. In the meantime, if there’s any way in the world we can get out of this 50-year commitment to
coal, and depend more on hydro, wind and solar energy sources, please do it.
Sally Medbourn Mott
Bowling Green