Current Bill Information Components
Included here is an itemized listing of the components of your bill. Listed below is a description of the different components.
The Power Supply charge, billed per kilowatt-hour (KWH) used, covers the cooperative’s wholesale cost of power and the transmission cost to deliver the power from the power plant to our substations.
Distribution charge covers some of the costs associated with the delivery of power to each cooperative member, including but not limited to, power lines & poles, transformers, metering equipment, substation equipment, vegetation maintenance, labor and plant. This charge is billed per kilowatt-hour (KWH) used.
The Power Cost Adjustment that you see on your bill is an amount per kilowatt-hour that will either be added to, or subtracted from your bill each month. This is determined by how much CWEC has to pay its power suppliers for the energy our members use each month. This amount changes month-to-month, depending on market conditions and the cost of fuel. CWEC includes a fixed amount of power costs into the energy rates our members pay. When the actual cost CWEC pays varies each month from the amount we build into our rates, we charge or refund the difference to our cooperative members.
The Basic Charge is a fixed daily charge that every CWEC member pays to help cover the basic cost of bringing electricity to his or her location. All co-op members benefit from having electrical power available when they need it; a Basic Charge ensures that every member pays a fair portion of the co-op’s basic costs.
The Public Benefit Tax portion of the bill is a state mandated charge designed to provide funding for energy assistance and energy conservation. We encourage our members to contact us to see what’s available to them.
For those members who participate in Operation Round Up, their monthly contribution is listed as Round Up Amount. Operation Round Up is a member funded program that provides monies for charitable and educational purposes.
You will see an amount here if you had an unpaid balance or a credit balance prior to the current billing.
ENERGY DEMAND USE INFORMATION ADDED TO MONTHLY BILLS
February 2025 - In March, a new line item will begin to appear on monthly residential electric bills. The new line item will show a member’s electric demand use. This is possible because of the recent installation of our new metering system.
We have always shown demand use for large businesses, as it has been part of their billing structure.
You are probably asking yourself, why are we adding demand use information to the electric bill. The most important thing to remember is that we are not charging for demand, the data is being provided for informational purposes only. Knowing your demand use helps you and the co-op understand what makes up your total bill. When doing a cost of service study, having this information available to our consultants will help them keep our rates fair for everyone.
To better understand demand, it is important to know the difference between Demand and Energy. Demand is the rate at which electricity is used at a given time and is measured in kilowatts (kW). Energy is the number of kilowatt-hours (kWh) or the amount of electricity a member used for a month.
Think of it in terms of your car’s speedometer:
For example, a car that travels at a rate of speed of 80 mph for a ½ hour, the miles driven is only 40 miles. In terms of electricity: If a member’s rate of demand consumption is 80 kW for a ½ hour, the kWh consumed is 40 kWh.
Large power accounts are billed for both the rate that energy is consumed (kW) and the amount of energy consumed (kWh).
To put it into context, think about how your dishwasher and washing machine both use electricity. The amount of electricity they use is the same regardless of when you use them. If you use them at the same time, you demand more electricity at that time. If you use them at separate times, your demand is lower.
For example, let’s say if you run your washing machine for an hour, it uses 0.7 kW, which would be your demand on our system for power. Let’s also say that if you use your dishwasher for an hour, it uses 1.8 kW, which would be your demand on our system for power. But if you run both the washing machine and dishwasher at the same time, the demand on our system for power would be 2.5 kW. Your demand becomes the total of the two because you need that much power at the same time.
From the above example, if you don’t run the washing machine and dishwasher at the same time, the highest demand for those two hours would be 1.8 kW, because it is the most demand you used at one time. The highest demand you set in one month is the highest amount of electricity used at once during a 15-minute interval in your billing cycle.