PSC & NWE – Please Do The Right Thing

Dear Editor,

As a state legislator, I've been saying for years that NorthWestern Energy has been gaming the system and that the Public Service Commission has allowed that to happen. We now find ourselves in a situation where profits for NorthWestern Energy have been steadily increasing with 2019 setting a new record for the company. We simply can't afford for this to continue.

Now that this COVID situation has knocked us down, customers can't keep getting kicked by unfair utility rates. It's far past time to rework the sweetheart deals the company has put in place.

Bad deals have been hurting NWE customers for a long time. Here's how.

Unlike most businesses, NorthWestern Energy is guaranteed a payment based on the value of what they own. The more stuff they own, the more they get from their customers. The higher the value placed on the stuff they own, the more money they get from their customers. Because of this odd deal, NorthWestern Energy has had an incentive to buy lots of expensive assets like dams and coal burning electrical generating plants. Ratepayers have to pay them for that. Worse yet, NorthWestern Energy has overstated the value of the stuff they bought. We have to repay them at those inflated values. As I see it, it's a driving factor behind why NorthWestern Energy customers pay higher rates than the other regulated monopoly in our state, MDU.

When I addressed this issue in the legislature, NorthWestern lobbyists asserted that inflating the value of their assets was legal because the Public Service Commission approved those values. That doesn't pass the smell test. What is legal is not always right. Shame on both the PSC and the company for imposing bad deals on Montanans.

Just last fall Northwestern Energy asked the PSC for a rate increase. This was in spite of the fact that the company recorded record profits. Predictably, the PSC granted a $6.5 million dollar increase, but it gets worse when you look at the way the increase was apportioned to different types of customers. Some types of customers got very large increases. Residential customers and irrigators are going to be paying Northwestern Energy over $23 million more while some commercial customers like Walmart will be paying $13 million less.

That's just wrong.

It's not as if Montanans haven't done right by NorthWestern Energy. When the company went bankrupt years ago the legislature stepped in and passed bills that allowed the company to shift property tax increases and outage costs to customers. The company was ALSO allowed to expand from being a "distribution only" company to being a monopoly that both generates AND distributes energy. A lot of us regret that now.

I hereby appeal the PSC and NorthWestern Energy to rethink and rework utility rates. Do the right thing. Cancel the rate increase that was approved last October. Set the value of Colstrip at its fair market so that customers are paying a fair amount for what the company invested. We simply can't afford for this current charade to continue.

We are losing our jobs at an alarming rate. If NorthWestern Energy is truly the great neighbor they portray themselves to be on their very expensive and unnecessary advertisements, they will reduce their electric and natural gas rates now. If the Public Service Commission can remember that they are supposed to value OUR interests in setting a balance between monopoly and monopolized, they will start showing up for work and be far more transparent and professional in their deliberations.

Sincerely,

Rep. Tom Woods

Candidate, PSC Dist. 3