Games The Power Companies Play
Put forth on September 23, 2008 by XicanoPwr
Posted in Hurricane Season, Texas
With more than a quarter of CenterPoint Energy’s electric customers still electric power 10 days after Hurricane Ike turned off the lights, it seems CenterPoint is deciding they will increase it’s rates to cover the cost of repairs.
According to the Houston Chronicle:
In a filing with the Securities Exchange Commission CenterPoint said “the total cost for that restoration is currently estimated to be in the range of $350 million to $500 million, but that estimate is preliminary at this time …”
CenterPoint CEO David McClanahan said in a press conference this afternoon that will most likely translate to a per customer monthly fee increase of between $1 and $2.
This would cover the costs for the extra manpower (i.e. the 8,000 outside workers brought in to shore up CenterPoint’s existing crews) and supplies like replacement poles, lines and transformers.
According to the filing, CenterPoint does not insure it’s “poles, towers, wires, street lights and the pole mounted equipment that comprise the transmission and distribution facilities.” My question is, why not?
We don’t have to worry right now, CenterPoint will have to have the approval of the Public Utility Commission, the fact is, the PUC creates an illusion that it’s mission is to protect to the consumers it services.
After Hurricane Rita hit, the PUC recommended that the electric companies take aggressive steps that could avoid all this headache. In another article in the Houston Chronicle, it was reported that the PUC had recommended that the power companies come up with an “aggressive tree-trimming programs and major upgrades, including replacing wooden electric polls with metal or concrete.”
However, the powers that be had it’s way and nothing was done, which three years later, 2.2 million people had to pay the price.
Utilities fought the measures on the grounds that upgrading the distribution system would cost far more than repairing it after a storm. The PUC in August ordered a cost-benefit analysis of only one recommendation: moving electric substations out of flood zones.
If last month PUC meeting is any indication which side they will take, it will be CenterPoint who will come out on top, just like Entergy Texas did in 2005, and not the consumers who they claim they are serving.
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Tags: CenterPoint, Hurricane Ike, PUC, Texas | 
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This is the blog of Edmundo "XicanoPwr" Rocha, a social worker, an activist, freelance writer and founder and editor of The Sanctuary. My interests include: immigration reform, critical race theory and it's interaction with equality/inequality and freedom/oppression as they relate to the experiences of people of color in the Americas.
Para Justicia y Libertad is a Latino-centered political blog focusing on the humanistic perspective of politics, history, and society as they relate to the Latina/o community throughout Texas and the United States.
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