The Future of Your Electricity Service
- by Jack Cederquist
March 2024
Photo courtesy of DTE
An opinion survey recently conducted on behalf of the City of Ann Arbor found that, with respect to electricity service, Ann Arbor residents are most concerned with electricity reliability and cost. This article will summarize three efforts to address the issue of reliability.
The 2023 outages in DTE electricity service prompted DTE to reach out to their customers. In October 2023, at DTE’s request, five OHMHA Board Members met via video with two DTE employees tasked with community outreach. The DTE presentation addressed several topics including their new Time of Day Rates, commitment to end coal use by 2032, to achieve net zero emissions by 2050, MIGreenPower program and electric vehicle rebates. This article addresses only their efforts to improve reliability.
To improve reliability, DTE commits to invest $9 billion over the next five years in tree trimming, grid hardening, automation and system rebuild across their entire service area. The presentation stated that 485 miles of trees in Ann Arbor were, or would be, trimmed in 2023. 95% of Ann Arbor trees will be trimmed every five years. Grid hardening consists of replacing at risk poles with steel poles and crossarms. 50% of Ann Arbor is on a ten-year pole maintenance cycle. Automation means enabling, within the next six years, remote monitoring and control to disconnect downed wires closer to the point of failure. This will reduce the number of customers unnecessarily experiencing an outage. 20% of Ann Arbor circuits should be automated in 2024. The entire Ann Arbor system will be converted from 4.8 kV to 13.2 kV lines. DTE states that this rebuild supports electric vehicle charging and “helps facilitate connecting wind, solar and storage opportunities.” No schedule for completion was given but the “Argo/Buckler project is active in north/northwest Ann Arbor.” One contact at DTE that may be useful is Maria Calleja at [email protected] and (313) 330-3010.
A second effort is led by the group Ann Arbor for Public Power. Their website states that they are a coalition of local residents and organizations advocating for a municipal (publicly-owned) electric utility (MEU) for Ann Arbor. Their goal is for the utility to provide electricity from net zero carbon emission sources and for that electricity to be reliable and affordable. The result would be acquisition and management of the current DTE electricity distribution assets located in the City of Ann Arbor. Electricity would be purchased from the transmission grid and could come from DTE or other electricity available on the grid. It might be possible for locally generated solar or even geothermal power to be included. Much more information is at https://annarborpublicpower.org.
State Senator Jeff Irwin has described a five-step process to create the municipal public utility. First, there would be a vote by citizens of Ann Arbor to begin the official process. The Michigan State Constitution requires at least 60% of votes in favor. Second, the City would fund a valuation of the DTE assets and make a purchase offer to DTE. Third, the City would negotiate with DTE to agree on a purchase price. In other cities, achieving agreement has required legal proceedings. Fourth, the voters would approve a bond issue to pay DTE under the agreed terms. Fifth, the new municipal electric utility would have an independent management structure, not directly part of the City of Ann Arbor government, put in place.
The new municipal electric utility would not have the expenses of corporate executives’ salaries, dividends paid to shareholders and lobbying the Michigan state government. The utility could keep costs for consumers the same and allocate the savings from these expenses to infrastructure investments or could pass the savings on to consumers to reduce their monthly bills. The utility would be more accountable to its customers by being locally operated.
A third effort is a Sustainable Electric Utility (SEU) led by the A2ZERO office of the City of Ann Arbor. A sustainable energy utility (SEU) is a non-profit, publicly-owned, municipal utility that provides affordable, 100% renewable, reliable, and locally sourced electricity. Unlike an MEU, an Ann Arbor SEU would not buy, own or utilize the DTE electricity infrastructure. The SEU would operate as an independent City utility with similar operations as other public services, such as the Ann Arbor water utility. The SEU would use local renewable electricity generation such as solar or geothermal systems to generate electricity. Battery or other storage systems would help to provide electricity reliability. Microgrids would be used to distribute electricity to neighborhoods or commercial areas in the City. DTE would continue as the City’s main provider of electricity with obligations to serve all customer electricity needs. Residents and businesses could choose to continue to be connected to DTE as the two distribution systems would be independent. The SEU primarily addresses the A2ZERO goal of 100% renewable energy for Ann Arbor by 2030 rather than reliability and cost. More discussion and a link to a recent study funded by the City is found HERE (click)
In summary, the issues of electricity reliability and cost for the City of Ann Arbor are being addressed not only by DTE but also by local efforts. We should expect continuing communication from DTE about their progress and also continued efforts by Ann Arbor for Public Power and the City’s A2ZERO office to study and promote their proposed electric utility solutions. The issues affect us all so we need to make the effort to be informed of new developments and progress.
The 2023 outages in DTE electricity service prompted DTE to reach out to their customers. In October 2023, at DTE’s request, five OHMHA Board Members met via video with two DTE employees tasked with community outreach. The DTE presentation addressed several topics including their new Time of Day Rates, commitment to end coal use by 2032, to achieve net zero emissions by 2050, MIGreenPower program and electric vehicle rebates. This article addresses only their efforts to improve reliability.
To improve reliability, DTE commits to invest $9 billion over the next five years in tree trimming, grid hardening, automation and system rebuild across their entire service area. The presentation stated that 485 miles of trees in Ann Arbor were, or would be, trimmed in 2023. 95% of Ann Arbor trees will be trimmed every five years. Grid hardening consists of replacing at risk poles with steel poles and crossarms. 50% of Ann Arbor is on a ten-year pole maintenance cycle. Automation means enabling, within the next six years, remote monitoring and control to disconnect downed wires closer to the point of failure. This will reduce the number of customers unnecessarily experiencing an outage. 20% of Ann Arbor circuits should be automated in 2024. The entire Ann Arbor system will be converted from 4.8 kV to 13.2 kV lines. DTE states that this rebuild supports electric vehicle charging and “helps facilitate connecting wind, solar and storage opportunities.” No schedule for completion was given but the “Argo/Buckler project is active in north/northwest Ann Arbor.” One contact at DTE that may be useful is Maria Calleja at [email protected] and (313) 330-3010.
A second effort is led by the group Ann Arbor for Public Power. Their website states that they are a coalition of local residents and organizations advocating for a municipal (publicly-owned) electric utility (MEU) for Ann Arbor. Their goal is for the utility to provide electricity from net zero carbon emission sources and for that electricity to be reliable and affordable. The result would be acquisition and management of the current DTE electricity distribution assets located in the City of Ann Arbor. Electricity would be purchased from the transmission grid and could come from DTE or other electricity available on the grid. It might be possible for locally generated solar or even geothermal power to be included. Much more information is at https://annarborpublicpower.org.
State Senator Jeff Irwin has described a five-step process to create the municipal public utility. First, there would be a vote by citizens of Ann Arbor to begin the official process. The Michigan State Constitution requires at least 60% of votes in favor. Second, the City would fund a valuation of the DTE assets and make a purchase offer to DTE. Third, the City would negotiate with DTE to agree on a purchase price. In other cities, achieving agreement has required legal proceedings. Fourth, the voters would approve a bond issue to pay DTE under the agreed terms. Fifth, the new municipal electric utility would have an independent management structure, not directly part of the City of Ann Arbor government, put in place.
The new municipal electric utility would not have the expenses of corporate executives’ salaries, dividends paid to shareholders and lobbying the Michigan state government. The utility could keep costs for consumers the same and allocate the savings from these expenses to infrastructure investments or could pass the savings on to consumers to reduce their monthly bills. The utility would be more accountable to its customers by being locally operated.
A third effort is a Sustainable Electric Utility (SEU) led by the A2ZERO office of the City of Ann Arbor. A sustainable energy utility (SEU) is a non-profit, publicly-owned, municipal utility that provides affordable, 100% renewable, reliable, and locally sourced electricity. Unlike an MEU, an Ann Arbor SEU would not buy, own or utilize the DTE electricity infrastructure. The SEU would operate as an independent City utility with similar operations as other public services, such as the Ann Arbor water utility. The SEU would use local renewable electricity generation such as solar or geothermal systems to generate electricity. Battery or other storage systems would help to provide electricity reliability. Microgrids would be used to distribute electricity to neighborhoods or commercial areas in the City. DTE would continue as the City’s main provider of electricity with obligations to serve all customer electricity needs. Residents and businesses could choose to continue to be connected to DTE as the two distribution systems would be independent. The SEU primarily addresses the A2ZERO goal of 100% renewable energy for Ann Arbor by 2030 rather than reliability and cost. More discussion and a link to a recent study funded by the City is found HERE (click)
In summary, the issues of electricity reliability and cost for the City of Ann Arbor are being addressed not only by DTE but also by local efforts. We should expect continuing communication from DTE about their progress and also continued efforts by Ann Arbor for Public Power and the City’s A2ZERO office to study and promote their proposed electric utility solutions. The issues affect us all so we need to make the effort to be informed of new developments and progress.