By Stephen Smoot
In two separate moves undertaken last summer and this fall, Monongahela Power Company and Potomac Edison, both part of the First Energy group, have applied for rate increases that, if approved, will take place starting Jan. 1 of next year.
On Aug. 2 of this year, the two companies applied for review and approval of “new Effluent Limitation Guideline Surcharge reconciliation.” This stems from regulations which first appeared in 1974 and were amended in 1977, 1978, 1980, 1982, 2015, 2020, and 2024. These cover the effluent, or, according to the United States Environmental Protection Agency, wastewater discharges from power plants operating as utilities. The 2024 rule “establishes more stringent standards for three wastewaters generated at coal-fired power plants. flue gas desulfurization, wastewater, bottom ash transport water, and combustion residual leachate.”
This, in addition to other restrictions imposed in recent years by the EPA, will, according to U.S. Senator Joe Manchin, result in a “death of a thousand cuts that could also affect natural gas-fired power plants, as well.”
U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito argued that the cumulative impact of regulations come from a Biden-Harris policy that “inexplicably doubled down on his plans to shut down the backbone of America’s electric grid through unachievable regulatory mandates.”
The Public Service Commission will hold an evidentiary hearing on Dec. 5 on this matter.
In the meantime, power companies must pass on the cost of compliance to customers already hit hard by inflation across the board. According to a document released by the West Virginia Public Service Commission, “the total proposed ELG rates represent a 0.1 percent increase in total rates with a monthly increase to a residential customer using 1,000 kilowatt hours per month of $0.12 from $137.58 to $137.70. This cost will affect small to medium sized businesses, government agencies, and nonprofit organizations more, depending on their amount of use.”
Monongahela Power and Potomac Edison also have an application in place with the PSC to obtain “review and approval of a Renewable Energy Surcharge (RES) reconciliation and true-up to establish revised surcharge rates.” These would also commence on Jan 1 of next year.
This increase, which would amount to $0.06 per 1000 kilowatt hours, would cover the difference between the lower cost of obtaining energy from traditional coal and natural gas power and that of the higher cost of solar and other “green” energy sources.
The PSC urged the companies to “provide notice to their customers of the proposed increase in rates and “establish a procedural schedule based on rates becoming effective no sooner than 150 days after filing.”
