Demise of coal leads to Amherst bill hikes

A transfer of $300,000 to make sure a fund can pay the city of Amherst electricity bills for the rest of the year led to a warning by Mayor David Taylor that rates will go up.

A federal initiative by President Barack Obama to shut down coal-fired electricity generation eventually will cause Amherst electricity bills to increase, Taylor said.

The city buys electricity from American Municipal Power in Columbus, Taylor said. Coal generates some Municipal Power electricity in Ohio.

Amherst residents pay from 10 percent to 15 percent lower electric rates than residents in neighboring cities and townships using large corporations, Taylor said.

The city transferred money from one account to another to pay the electric bill because at the beginning of the year, it logged higher than expected electric bills, Taylor said.

There’s plenty of money in the electric account, said David Kukucka, auditor for Amherst.

“We had a bill of $1.1 million,” Taylor said, “which was higher than we normally have, but nothing we couldn’t handle. We’ve had some issues.

“Next year, the less coal generations we use, the higher the price is going to be. They are trying to shut down these coal generation plants. When they shut down coal plants, our costs will go up.”

Council member Joe Miller said he expects another form of electricity generation to replace coal.

“When one source steps out, I wouldn’t be surprised to see another source step in,” Miller said. “I think natural gas, through gas fracking, is going to step in.” “We’ll disagree on that,” Taylor said. Locally, though, neighbors complained about their electric bills being higher than normal, Miller said.

The Power Purchase Adjustment, also known as PPA, changes every month and has decreased, Taylor said. The city’s cost for electricity reflects to the customer in the power purchase adjustment, he said.

The total bill divided by kilowatts should be nine cents or 10 cents per kilowatt, he said.

“It depends on usage,” Taylor said. “The more you use, the more your bill will be. We’ve had comments, ‘Why don’t we bury the PPA in the bill?’ We could do that. But I think we’re being more transparent the way we’re doing it.”

Amherst sends water and electric bill information in the same mailing, Taylor said. Customers should see a change in October on water bills as a result of negotiations with the city of Elyria, the water provider.

“In the scheme of things, our utility bills aren’t that different from in other entities,” Taylor said. “We watch that very carefully every month. That’s why we went to the effort to lower one of these utility bills.”