Reform Central Alabama Electric Coop (CAEC)
Do you know that if you are a CAEC customer you pay almost $500 a year* — even if you don't flip a single light switch? Or that if you wish to add solar panels this fixed fee jumps to almost $750 a year*? However, there is some good news: If you are a CAEC member you are also a CAEC owner. This is due to the nature of co-ops; you have the power to change these egregious fixed fees. Let us show you how...
Central Alabama Electric Cooperative is a not for profit, member-owned electric distribution utility serving more than 42,000 members in a 10-county area of central Alabama just north of Montgomery. The cooperative’s service area covers most of the rural areas of Autauga, Elmore, Coosa and Chilton counties as well as members in Tallapoosa, Talladega, Bibb, Perry, Dallas and Lowndes counties.The cooperative is a $199 million company with 5,500 miles of line serviced by 120 employees. Source: CAEC
CAEC Districts and Member Counts
If You Don't Like Paying Almost $500 In Fixed Fees Every Year, You Are Not Alone
My name is Kyle Crider, and I am the Program Coordinator for Alabama Interfaith Power & Light. I am also a 2019-2020 We Own It Energy Fellow, tasked with reducing Americans' energy burdens and specifically reforming electric cooperatives like CAEC. Here in Alabama, where our state motto is "We Dare Defend Our Rights," we don't appreciate paying something for nothing. CAEC will try to tell you that such fixed fees somehow work more to your advantage than setting appropriate power rates for power actually used. Don't believe them. This move toward "easy money" fixed fees is part of a general move by electric utilities and cooperatives all over the nation -- but it is being resisted by folks like us. (You can read what the highly-respected Consumer Reports folks have to say about electric bill fixed fees here​.)
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If you would like more information on reducing energy burdens in Alabama (whether or not you are a CAEC member), we want to hear from you. And, if you are a CAEC member, we hope you will sign this petition to reduce or eliminate CAEC's egregious fixed fees.
* All fees calculated from CAEC's Rates & Availability. For residential service customers , CAEC charges a Daily Access Charge (no kWh included) of $1.36/day. This totals $496.40 in fixed fees every year, in addition to any charges for power you have actually used! Yet if you have the audacity to want to put clean, renewable, energy generated from free sunlight back on the grid, CAEC charges you $2.05 each and every day! This totals $748.25 every year. According to the Rates of Solar web site, this fee adds $21,600 to the $10,885 average cost of a solar system in Alabama over a 30-year system lifespan. In other words, you will pay far more in fixed fees over the life of your system than your system originally cost!