LANSING – The Public Service Commission on Thursday authorized the Upper Peninsula Power Company to increase its electric rates, but by an amount 30.4 percent lower than the utility had requested.
Also, because the final amount approved ($4,647,975 annually) is lower than the more than $6.2 million the utility self-implemented in March, the PSC said in a statement that customers will see a rate decrease effective September 23 and will get a refund of the difference between what the utility had self-implemented and the PSC granted, plus interest, in the future.
As a result of PSC’s Thursday approval (case U-17895) though, residential customers using 500 kilowatt-hours of electricity a month will see an increase of $7.63 (6.81 percent) on their monthly bills over rates set in the last rate case, which was December 2013.
The utility had originally requested an increase of $6.68 million annually.
CONSUMERS ENERGY: The PSC also approved a settlement agreement (case U-18025) authorizing Consumers Energy Company to reconcile its 2015 energy optimization costs for gas and electric. As a result, a residential electric customer will see no change on their monthly bill, but a residential natural gas customer using 100 ccf of natural gas a month would see an increase of 3 cents on their monthly bills beginning with the January 2017 billing month.
THUMB ELECTRIC COOPERATIVE: In another case (case U-18167), the PSC directed Thumb Electric Cooperative to make certain filings and to meet with PSC staff as it transitions to a member-regulated cooperative. It is set to do so on November 26 assuming it fulfills all of the notice and hearing requirements of the Electric Cooperative Member Regulation Act.
It will become the ninth and final electric cooperative to become member-regulated since the 2008 law became effective, the PSC said.
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