An April 4 report urged state officials to gather more information before making a decision on a bid to provide Delawareans with a source of long-term energy generation.
In response to legislation approved last year, which was aimed at providing price stability for Delaware customers, three companies submitted bids in December to enter into a long-term energy supply contract with Delmarva Power.
State officials had originally hoped to approve one of the three bids early next month and to begin contract negotiations. It is yet unclear how this latest consultant’s report will affect the process.
Conectiv’s bid to build a natural gas plant upstate was favored by reports issued jointly last month by Delmarva Power, which would ultimately supply the resulting power to customers, and the state’s independent consultant, which also authored last week’s report.
A Bluewater Wind proposal to build a wind farm off Delaware’s coast came in second in the March report, with NRG’s bid to build a “clean coal” plan ranking third, and least cost-viable.
The state consultant’s independent report, issued last Wednesday, criticized Delmarva Power, in part, for not considering “self-build” generation, as well as the effects of closing two generation units at NRG’s notorious coal-fired power plant at Indian River, and for not looking outside of Delaware for bids.
Last Wednesday’s report also urged state officials to consider a “renewable-only” request for bids, which could bring greater attention to potential alternative energy options such as the wind farm proposal. Throughout the bidding process, many Sussex County residents have ardently backed the wind farm proposal, touting it as environmentally friendly and cost-effective.
Delmarva Power and the state’s consultant concurred with their conclusions on the issue last month, though, reporting that all three of the existing proposals would come with more expensive price tags than buying wholesale energy from the market — a move Delmarva Power favors over a long-term contract.
The consultant also recognized in the April 4 report the unpredictable nature of natural gas prices, which have risen 400 percent in less than a decade and caused energy prices to skyrocket nationwide. Some have expressed confusion about the report’s backing of the Conectiv natural gas plan in the face of such unpredictability.
The state passed legislation passed last year that led to the bidding process. That legislation came in response to a spike in Delmarva Power energy prices after rate caps were lifted on May 1. Residential rates rose nearly 60 percent, with some commercial rates jumping an astronomical 119 percent.
The spikes also prompted statewide, Chamber of Commerce-led and grassroots co-op campaigns that sought to lower prices for residential and commercial customers. Several such co-ops have already been formed and are now supplying lower-rate energy to local customers.