The increase in delivery fees that Commonwealth Edison will charge electric users will be invisible on their bills early next year, after state regulators awarded the utility practically nothing on its request for a rate increase.
ComEd had requested an increase of $345.5 million for the fee it charges to deliver electricity to customers, according to the Illinois Commerce Commission. But state regulators delivered a harsh rejection of ComEd’s request, awarding the utility just $8.3 million.
The governor, state attorney general’s office and consumer advocates on Friday all praised the ICC for its decision, saying it protected the public.
“It’s a great day for consumers,” said David Kolata, executive director of the Citizens Utility Board, which with others had opposed the increase.
“We are glad the ICC stood up to ComEd’s money grab,” he said.
The fee, however, does not cover ComEd’s cost of acquiring electricity from generators, which include the utility’s corporate sister, Exelon Nuclear. That cost will be determined at an auction in September and go into effect at the beginning of next year. Electric rates are expected to go up significantly then.
ComEd on Friday said it would ask the ICC to reconsider its decision on the delivery fees. Earlier the utility threatened to take the issue to court.
“We are surprised and quite disappointed with this result,” said J. Barry Mitchell, president of ComEd.
Mitchell noted that ComEd’s rates for residential customers were reduced 20 percent and frozen since 1997, saving residential customers $4 billion. That freeze expires at the end of the year.
Requesting almost any kind of rate hike from the ICC is a laborious process involving months of effort by many people to report and review a utility’s finances. Kolata said ComEd may have spent more money making its request than it ended up receiving from regulators.
Rishi Garg, an assistant attorney general in the public utility bureau of the state attorney general’s office, who had opposed ComEd’s request, said the utility’s arguments for a big rate increase were weak.
“They didn’t show the commission that what they were asking for was just and reasonable,” Garg said.
The decision also pleased Gov. Rod Blagojevich.
“The ICC made the right decision today when it rejected ComEd’s request to significantly increase delivery rates for electricity,” the governor said in a written statement.
On Wednesday the five commissioners of the ICC voted unanimously on ComEd’s request. But the commissioners made several major last minute changes in the proposed decision and it took until Friday for the commission’s staff to compute the sum ComEd will receive.
The fee goes into effect at the beginning of 2007 and is the company’s first increase in a decade.
“Our job was not an easy one,” said ICC Chairman Charles Box in a statement. “I believe this is a fair order.”
Distribution charges currently account for 20 to 30 percent of a customer’s bill, the ICC said. ComEd put the figure at 30 to 40 percent for residential customers.
The ICC said the fee provides $1.7 billion in revenue to ComEd for delivering electricity to its customers. The company no longer generates power.
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Rmanor@tribune.com
