County commissioners approve plan to save money on electricity
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Victoria County could be involved in a power struggle by the end of the year.
But officials said it’s a struggle that will only benefit the taxpayers by cutting the county’s cost for electricity to power county buildings.
“There is no doubt in my mind we will be able to save money,” County Judge Don Pozzi said. “I can’t give you a figure until I see what the rate is.”
The commissioners court voted in May to begin withdrawing from the Public Power Pool. Public Power Pool is a group of about 81 cities, counties, school districts and other governments that pool their buying power to purchase electricity at a discounted price.
The commissioner court on Monday approved an agreement with Massachusetts-based World Energy Solutions Inc. to find a retail electric provider to provide the county’s power.
David Morrison, a World Energy representative, said there would be a bidding process that allows power providers to keep lowering prices. At the end of the “auction,” the company with the lowest price would get the county’s business.
Glencora Campbell with GSE Consulting in Houston said her company would continually monitor prices after a provider is selected. “If the market does come down, we have the authority to renegotiate.”
But Pozzi said the county’s rate will not exceed the initially negotiated price. It can only go down.
Morrison said there is no charge to the county for his service. World Energy instead collects a fee from the electric provider.
The motion to hire World Energy was approved unanimously, with Commissioner Wayne Dierlam absent and Commissioner Kevin Janak abstaining.
Janak, who did most of the research for the project, abstained because he works for a power generator.
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I wanted to shed some light on the previous comment posted by MegaWatt since it sounds like they might be little confused on how this process works.
GSE has handled the energy procurement for our facilities across Texas. Thus, we are very familiar with the reverse auction procurement procress through World Energy. Morrison is correct in saying there is no charge to the county. The Retail Electricity Provider that wins the business pays a fee per kWh to the consultant for their services. It works out great for the REP since they reduce their cost of customer aquisition, and works out great for the customer since the REP pays the fee.
We compared pricing that GSE was able to obtain for our facilities to the pricing that we were able to obtain on our own. The GSE pricing came in almost 10% lower since they were able to drive down prices through the formal bid process. We were more than pleased with the outcome and recommend using both GSE and World Energy.
Finally, in regardgs to servicing the account, the Retail Electric Provider that wins the business services the acouunt. Thus, if the REP service is poor, the energy consultant helps fix the problem.
August 6, 2008 at 10:30 a.m."Morrison said there is no charge to the county for his service. World Energy instead collects a fee from the electric provider."
No charge, so naif. World Energy and GSE Consulting receive a commission from the selected REP that is added to the and hidden in the per/kWh. May be as much as $003/kWh. Beware of GSE Consulting, they promise a lot and deliver very little. Once in, you can't get out until the contract expires and they continue to make their money regardless of how poorly they service your account.
July 29, 2008 at 12:46 p.m.