CUB’s Regulatory Year in Review for Giving Tuesday

It’s week number three of CUB’s Giving Tuesday campaign. After articulating in week one why we participate in the global Giving Tuesday movement, and how member contributions directly support our bottom line, we followed up last week with an account of CUB’s unique contribution to legislative advocacy in Oregon. Today, we’re pleased to share key regulatory advocacy accomplishments from this past year, and highlight how your donations benefit the health, welfare, and economic well-being of Oregon utility consumers.

2019 was an extremely busy and successful year on the regulatory front. We opposed and negotiated mergers, achieved rate increase reductions, continued to move the needle on coal plant closures, and empowered customers through new technology applications.

Mergers

• CUB objected to Hydro One’s (a Canadian electric utility partially owned by the government of Ontario), purchase of Avista Utilities after the Premier of Ontario decided to fire Hydro One’s CEO and interfere in the utility’s operations. In January, both Idaho and Washington rejected the proposed merger.
• Northwest Fiber proposed to acquire Frontier Communications’ Northwest assets. Frontier is a telecommunications company providing voice and broadband service to portions of the Portland Metro area and rural Oregon. CUB advocated for, and won, new investment in fiber-based broadband infrastructure in Frontier’s network, including millions of dollars outside of the Portland Metro area.

Rate Cases

• Cascade, a natural gas utility serving Central and Eastern Oregon, requested a 5 percent residential rate increase. CUB reduced the increase to less than 3 percent by ensuring that the benefits of lower corporate tax rates are passed through to customers.
• Avista, a natural gas utility serving Southern and Eastern Oregon, sought an 8 percent residential rate increase. CUB lowered the increase to 4.5 percent.

Additional Policy Wins

• Pacific Power will replace roughly 80 percent of each of its existing wind turbines to increase their output and make them eligible for federal tax credits, but the company requested to continue earning a profit on the removed equipment. CUB previously won a lawsuit stopping Portland General Electric (PGE) from earning profits on the Trojan nuclear power plant and argued, successfully, that the same precedent applies here. CUB reached an agreement with Pacific Power to remove the profits and limit the rate impact to less than 1 percent.
• After years of pressure from CUB and other groups, Pacific Power agreed to examine the economics of its remaining coal fleet and (unsurprisingly) found that several plants are uneconomic, which sets the stage for some of the plants’ expedited closure.
• CUB continues to work with PGE on its Smart Grid Test Bed which launched over the summer. The concept is to pay customers to adjust their loads in support of the grid rather than building new gas-fired power plants.

This is just a sample of CUB’s regulatory wins in 2019. Yet these highlights offer a peek into why CUB’s advocacy on behalf of Oregon utility consumers is so important, and how membership support of CUB’s work directly benefits the health, welfare, and economic well-being of Oregon utility consumers. Giving Tuesday only comes once a year – so make a difference in 2019 by contributing to CUB on or before Giving Tuesday, December 3.

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