One of the points for discussion and follow up from the 2008 Economic Growth Summit was Ocala Electic Utility rates. The EDC has convened the top ten energy customers to develop short and long term recommendations to present to City Manager Rick Horst. The committee is currently prioritizing the following recommendations:Short Term Recommendations:

• Clarification from OEU on what makes up the price structure formulas and multipliers
• Sufficient notice or lead time before rate changes take effect
• Eliminating or reducing bulk power rate fee for a year
• Possible reduction of Utility Tax
• Possible discount or rate adjustments based on peak and non-peak usage hours
• Reducing rates for large users that buy in bulk quantities
• Creating a goal for reduced rates and instituting mandated productivity improvements in OEU
• Improving communications with account representatives and related customer service policies

Long Term Recommendations:

• Rebates for companies that put capital dollars into their plants to reduce energy consumption
• Incentives for companies that reduce energy consumption (Green)
• Exploring a system for allowing the sell-back of generated power to OEU for companies that are able to develop internal generation power systems
• Eliminate energy management services cost

What do you think? We appreciate the openness of City Manager Rick Horst and Ocala City Council to listen to concerned commercial users of electricity.

This entry was posted on Friday, November 14th, 2008 at 12:20 pm and is filed under 2008 Economic Summit, EDC Activities, Technology Ventures. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.