P.U.C. under pressure as B.E.L. makes new rate application
Less than a week after it was formally denied a fifteen percent rate increase, Belize Electricity Limited has submitted a new price hike request to the Public Utilities Commission for a slightly lower amount. Whereas B.E.L. had asked for an additional six point five cents per kilowatt hour as part of its Threshold Event Review, the company is now calling on the P.U.C. to approve a six cents hike—thirteen point four percent—under its Annual Review Proceeding. While the Public Utilities Commission denied the first application on the grounds that it felt B.E.L. could remain financially viable in 2008 without a rate change, at a press briefing this morning, P.U.C. officials maintained that the A.R.P. is a much more involved process than the TERP.
Victor Lewis, Director, Electricity, P.U.C.
“We requested B.E.L.’s cash flow and we looked at B.E.L.’s cash flow and we said in our assessment that within this time limit, no. It is not necessary for you to ask for fifteen percent raise with that cash flow projection. We think within this time limit that we have for TERP, that can change, that can change, that can change. Now we are not in TERP anymore TERP has finished, we are now in A.R.P. We have a longer term to interrogate and we are saying let’s put all the valuables on the table, let’s evaluate those, if you deserve a rate, we will recommend one. If you do not deserve a rate, we will recommend another pattern of behaviour.”
Roberto Young, Chairman, Public Utilities Commission
“We need to look at their submission. The first submission that came in was only for the cost of power, now this is overall rates. Not only cost of power but value added and CPRSA.”
Victor Lewis
“If the rate that the consumer pays stays unmoved, then under B.E.L.’s prediction with the cost of power going up, then there will continue to be a difference for several months between what the consumer pays and what B.E.L. pays its suppliers. That will go into the Cost of Power Rate Stabilization Account. The CPRSA is derived from the consumer pays a quote unquote stable rate throughout the year. That includes the cost of power and the value added of delivery and other. We are addressing the cost of power. The stable rate that the consumer pays is related only to the cost of power nothing else.”
The P.U.C. continues to stress that public participation in the Annual Review Proceeding is crucial. Copies of B.E.L.’s application are available at their offices countrywide, at P.U.C. headquarters on Gabourel Lane and at www.puc.bz. Deadline for comments from the public is April twenty-second, with the Commission’s initial decision slated for no later than May second. If no one objects to that determination, the P.U.C. adopts the initial decision as its final ruling. However, if either the company or the public takes issue with the findings, an independent expert is called in to review the initial decision. Within twenty days of that appointment, the expert submits a written report to the P.U.C. While the expert’s advice is taken into consideration, these findings are not binding on the P.U.C.’s final decision. Any changes to electricity rates would take effect on July first.
