*Data includes residential locations. Commercial customers will vary from the information below.
Residents who live in the service area of Clay Center Public Utilities receive a monthly bill with line-item fees including electricity, water, sewage, and trash. Though the latter two are run by the city itself, not CCPU, it’s more streamlined to invoice via a single entity, said Public Utilities Superintendent, Scott Glaves. Adding that the City of Clay Center is funded by taxes, while CCPU is supported by its own revenue.
Therefore, the city pays a monthly fee to have the billing done on their behalf, while their funds due head back to the City’s account.
CCPU handles area electricity and water, including in town and rural locations. For residents, this means a single bill rather than paying multiple entities each month.
Electric Service Fee: This fee is a fixed fee of the electric meter of $7. CCPU owns and manages all electricity meters. Glaves said the fee is also a more efficient way of recovering cost. If they increase the price of power or water, there is no way to know a final number until the resources have been used. By offering a set fee per meter, CCPU is able to set a static number. He added that many companies charge four times higher monthly fees, while CCPU has tried to keep theirs as low as possible.
Electric: This is the base cost of a home’s electricity. Rates are tiered, charged a rate for the first 100 kilowatts, a lower price for the next 200, then the next 1,000, and then 2,000. Glaves said this was a trend that began in the 70s when electric companies wanted their customers to use more, and offering a lower rate for the more power that was consumed per address.
Energy Cost Adjustment: Now comes the fee that is the most complicated, Glaves said. He is often asked about by customers, particularly in summer months. Because CCPU bills for the previous 30 days, the money they bring in is often lower than what they are spending for purchased power costs in the status quo. To avoid an account deficit, the Energy Cost Adjustment, or ECA, makes up the difference.
“In the simplest form, it’s a true-up every month of what our purchase power cost and what we collected,” he said.
The number changes monthly and it’s readjusted every month to the penny, he said.
“In a perfect world we wouldn’t have big swings in temperature and the ECA rate would stay pretty flat,” he said. “But in Kansas we have all seasons. There will be months where it will move quite a bit, in summer and the winter load causes it to come back up. Then in April it’s going to fall off and stay flat until June.”
The fees are based on volume of power used and the price of incoming power, which includes many variables, none of which CCPU can control. For instance, changes in the weather, wind, solar, as well as how much power is being pulled to other areas, which could clog up the grid.
In total, CCPU will range between spending $285,000 and $450,000 per month on energy. In Clay Center, the peak power is in the summer heat, Glaves said, though winter days come close to that peak.
Electric Subsidy: This is a fee from the city to operate within their limits. It’s standard among electric companies, Glaves said. Most entities refer to it as a franchise fee, however legally as a public utility, it’s referred to as a subsidy.
Sewer: These fees are paid to the city. A person’s rate is based on their water usage from January through March of any given year. Each year, city staff looks at those numbers to assign a sewer rate to each address.
Solid Waste/Trash: Trash is also paid to the city. Each address is charged per their setup: one or more trash bins and whether or not they participate in recycling.
Water: This, too, is a baseline fee for the amount of water used in 30 days. Water is charged by cubit feet at a flat fee.
Water Service Fee: As with the electricity, this is a fixed fee on each location’s water meter, of $3.
Water Fee: Usually a small amount, Glaves said this is charged by the state of Kansas. The funds go directly to the state and are sent to the Kansas Water Protection and Clean Drinking Water fund
Water Subsidy: This fee works much like the electric’s subsidy fee. Same as the electric subsidy and is transferred to the City.
In all, Glaves said CCPU bills 45 million kilowatt hours per year, which is down from 50 kw hours. This is due to residents learning to become more energy efficient, such as replacing windows or purchasing newer appliances.
“Energy is trading in real time every five minutes,” he said. “Our sales is a variable we can’t control and it’s our only revenue. That’s why we have to true-up every month. But we’re very fortunate in Kansas because are in an energy-rich environment which helps keep costs down.”
