Have Questions? CONTACT US HERE

Wizard Energy
CONTACT

Tag: Public Utility Commission

  • The Real Power To Choose

    In 1999, Texas passed a law that changed the marketplace so residents and businesses could choose their electricity provider with various types of customer service levels, plans, rates, etc. The free market was supposed to encourage competition and lower prices.

    In conjunction with the new law, the Power to Choose (www.powertochoose.org) was intended to be the fact-based, unbiased website of the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) to compare electricity rates for your home (residential), but big electricity companies are sneaky!

    The Best Electricity Rate is The Lowest Electricity Rate, Right?

    Sure you have the power to choose and shop around to hunt down the lowest electricity rate but electric companies have the power to deceive too. They have learned how to skirt the system and present devious terms into their offers/contracts to dup residential electricity customers into paying a high rate.

    Fight Back With The Real Power To Choose & Uncover The Real Lowest Electricity Rate

    Save on Your Electric Bill

    GET THE BEST ELECTRICTY RATE

    Everything Wizard Energy does is rooted in honesty and Impartiality in dealing with big electricity companies. Today, we partner with Chariot Energy because they offer a clear and low fixed-rate.

    CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP FOR RESIDENTIAL SERVICES

    Please note that you will leave this website and connect to Chariot Energy.

    Here’s what to look for and how to get the lowest electric rate in Houston and throughout Texas in 2022.

    Minimum Usage

    This is a sneaky tactic that is a bunch of smoke and mirrors. The electricity provider adds a “minimum usage” term in the agreement like 2000 kWh. If you use that much energy you get a rebate. If not, no rebate. This allows them to advertise a really low rate when a residential customer uses exactly 2000 kilowatt hours.

    If you are conservative with your energy usage at home and don’t reach the minimum usage, then you do not receive the rebate, and your effective price on electricity essentially doubles going from $.14/kWh to $.28/kWh or higher. And once you go above 2000 kWh, the rate steadily goes up to a very high rate steadily trending up from $.14/kWh up $.05 every few hundred kilowatt hours you use over 2000. It is a awful tactic and unfortunately the PUCT allows it.

    Avoid “minimum usage” at all costs!

    Market Rate (Indexed) Electricity Price

    The rate you pay in an indexed rate plan (also called market rate plan) can go up or down each month. The difference is that the rate is tied to a pricing formula connected to a publicly available index. If the index rises, your monthly rate will also, but if the index falls, your rates will be lower. With an indexed plan, the price per kWh can change substantially each month, which is a HUGE RISK.

    Any rate tied to a formula for residential electricity should be avoided. It’s an unnecessary complication. Why can’t they just present a simple price? Avoid “Market Rate” electricity plans!

    Changing Rate (Variable) Electricity Price

    Variable rate plans have no monthly contract or cancellation fee, but the rate you pay per kilowatt hour can vary from month to month. The rate can go up or down based on the discretion of a big electricity company.

    You can gamble on free market prices falling in the future, but you increase the risk of it going up due to natural disasters, cold winters, or adverse market conditions.

    This is not worth the risk. The electricity company has zero risk and you take it all. Avoid “Variable Rate” electricity plans!

    THE BEST: Fixed Rate Electricity Price

    A fixed-rate plan has a set rate that doesn’t change throughout the contract. It is as simple as that! It gives you peace of mind and allows you to budget your household.

    Texas

    Ready to Simply Get The Lowest FIXED (BEST) Electricity Rate?

    SIGN UP FOR RESIDENTIAL SERVICES

    Please note that you will leave this website and connect to Chariot Energy.

    Other Ways to Lower Your Electricity Bill

    Save Money on Electricity in 2022


    Electricity Prices Are Going Up – Here Are Other Ways to Save

  • Legal Arguments on $9,000 Electricity Rates in Texas

    The Texas Public Utility Commission’s February 2021 emergency rules allowing an increase in electric rates to $9,000 per megawatt hour in response to Winter Storm were invalid and screwed up the state’s power system.

    Dallas-based Luminant Energy asked a 3-judge panel in the Texas Third Court of Appeals in Austin to declare that the PUC illegally adopted two pricing rules during the historic storm that allowed the Electric Reliability Council of Texas to increase the emergency price of electricity 650% for five days.

    The PUC contended that the energy companies are simply upset because they lost money during Winter Storm and extreme weather conditions.

    Many argue that the PUC decision to set rates at $9,000 for the five days during the winter storm forced many electric providers to pay billions to provide power to their residential and commercial customers, while other electric companies profited by selling power at high rates.

    Impact on Providers & Electric Rates

    The decision by the Austin Court of Appeals will dramatically impact the efforts by more than a dozen electric providers challenging their ERCOT invoices.

    The winter storm that hit Texas on Feb. 14, 2021, caused the electricity to go out in large portions of the state, especially in the Houston area. Power demand surged in other metro areas, and at the same time, many electric generators went off-line because natural gas providers were unable to supply product to electric generators.

    Sneaky Electricity Price Manipulation

    In a six-minute meeting Feb. 15, the PUC decided to address the gap between supply and demand by issuing an emergency reset of the maximum price to $9,000 per megawatt hour, which is way up from $1,200. It also made the $9,000 price retroactive to Feb. 14. The next day, however, the PUC met again and rescinded the retroactive part of its order.

    Electricity Price Competition

    The high-stakes litigation pits the energy companies against each other… Houston-based Pattern Energy, Exelon Generation and Constellation NewEnergy are supporting Luminant in the litigation. All are fighting multibillion-dollar charges as a result of the $9,000 price. Lawyers argued that both emergency pricing rules were invalid for multiple reasons, including the fact that the PUC never filed the rule change with the Secretary of State’s office. This is a case where the agency disregarded legal procedures. It did not follow the law. The PUC has staked out extreme and unprecedented positions.

    Houston-based Calpine Corporation, Talen Energy and TexGen Power support the PUC position. Spring, Texas-based DGP2 and Distributed Solutions argue that the first PUC rule is valid but the second-day rule rescinding retroactivity was illegal. Companies like Luminant are just using the litigation to try to shift their market losses to other parties.

    Texas Assistant Solicitor General, Lisa Bennett (representing the PUC), told the judges that the PUC did not violate Texas law because the agency’s actions were a direction to ERCOT, not rulemaking. She argued that the law provides wide discretion for the PUC to make such decisions because the PUC’s actions were taken during an extreme emergency and because there was a flaw in the system – there were negative reserves, but the price was not going up.

    Hindsight

    When the emergency passed, market participants assessed the financial outcomes of the complex actions they and others had taken in the market during the storm, and some suffered staggering losses. In hindsight, some market participants now want to blame the PUC for their losses and argue that the orders were illegal all along.