Community electricity program could help you save on energy
Over a thousand miles away from Cambridge, Massachusetts, a solar panel installation is surrounded by farmland as far as the eye can see in central Illinois.
The energy created there will not only help grain silos in the Midwest but homes in Cambridge too, through its Community Electricity Program.
Households enrolled in the Cambridge Community Electricity program are paying less for electricity compared to Eversource’s basic service— starting in February, 14.48 cents per kilowatt hour compared to 15.62 cents per kilowatt hour.
They are also receiving more renewable energy: 75% of their electricity supply compared to the 30% required by state law.
This is because of new solar and wind power projects developed in Illinois and North Dakota.
“It’s sort of like shopping for electricity at Costco. You’re getting a bulk purchase price,” said Megan Shaw, climate strategy and implementation manager for the city of Cambridge. “Our commitment to buy the renewable energy certificates over the next 15 years allowed them to build the project, get financing, and now they’re operating, they’re generating renewable energy certificates, and those renewable energy certificates are actually decreasing the carbon emissions of all of the electricity used by Cambridge Community Electricity customers.”
It’s a false choice to say it’s affordability versus climate action. We have to do both.
Cambridge Chief Climate Officer Julie Wormser
She explained that about 80% of Cambridge residents are enrolled in the group electricity buying program and their combined purchasing power, along with a consortium which includes Harvard, Mass General Brigham and MIT, allows them to negotiate multi-year contracts with an electricity supplier.f
“Because we’re signing a multi-year contract, we’re fixing that price with the supplier over time,” said Shaw. “So that fixed price gives our consumers a lot of confidence to be able to plan for, how much is my electricity going to cost for the next– this contract is for the next three years.”
Gov. Maura Healey announced a plan to help cut costs ahead of her State of the Commonwealth Address. It will impact customers of the state’s five largest utilities.
Eversource and other utility companies change rates every six months under state law. Those rates can fluctuate based on supply and demand, the market price of energy and public policy mandates.
A comparison of Cambridge Community Electricity and Eversource’s basic service prices since 2017 shows the variability and that there are periods when Eversource is cheaper.
As a result of this program, municipal buildings like the Cambridge Water Department, which uses a lot of electricity to pump water, are net zero for greenhouse gas emissions.
“I’m incredibly proud of our energy team for making sure that our residents and our small businesses have the cheapest, greenest electricity of anything they could purchase,” Cambridge Chief Climate Officer Julie Wormser said.
This, she said, is just the beginning of their work to phase out fossil fuels and meet climate change goals in Massachusetts and beyond.
“It’s a false choice to say it’s affordability versus climate action. We have to do both,” said Wormser.
“You know, I think that climate change can feel really big and scary. And sometimes it feels like you as one individual can’t do enough,” said Shaw. “One thing that Cambridge Community Electricity Program does, it says, you know, this is actually an aggregation. We’re all acting collectively as citizens and business owners here in Cambridge. And so I would just encourage people to make sure that they have remained automatically enrolled. And if they haven’t, to go ahead and call and get enrolled, because this does make a difference both locally and globally. So, it’s a pretty easy way to feel like you are collectively making a difference.”
Eversource still handles the delivery of the electricity and billing. So customers will see the supply charge impacted by Cambridge Community Electricity, but the delivery charge will remains the same. That’s where Eversource charges for the cost of delivering the electricity including maintenance and government mandated charges.