Today’s Good News: Illinois Citizens Close To Victory Over Electric Companies
Many states have deregulated electric utilities in recent years, and saddled their citizens with huge rate increases as a result. Illinois has been among them. But right now, Illinois folks are on the verge of winning $1 billion in electric rate relief, and an end to the “reverse auction” system that led to the rate hikes. A vote should happen in the state’s General Assembly next week. The Citizens Utility Board (CUB) says that “tens of thousands of Illinois consumers who contacted their legislators helped bring a bill that would freeze electric rates to the brink of passage and forced the companies [Ameren and Com Ed] to negotiate.”
In January 2006, the Illinois Commerce Commission (ICC) voted 5-0 to allow Ameren and Exelon/ComEd to start using this “auction” system. I won’t go into a lot of detail, but this was an incredible rip-off. These 2 companies, who don’t have any competition in Illinois, were able to “buy” power in the “auction” from their own parent companies at whatever price those parents chose to charge - then pass the increases on to consumers. Not only that, but the original deregulation bill (back in 1997) stripped the ICC of the right to regulate these companies and their prices. The “magic of the marketplace” (read “monopoly”) was supposed to protect people. Meanwhile, rates went up as much as 300%, and the companies’ profits went from already substantial to astronomical. Kudos to CUB (read more here) for their good work in mobilizing people to get this situation back under some kind of control.
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