Less expensive, cleaner energy? Working on it, councilman says

“It’s tough to save money on Long Island” and perhaps even harder on Shelter Island when it comes to the cost of electricity.

The speaker was Councilman Mike Bebon reporting to his colleagues on the Town Board about efforts in Suffolk County to lower high electric bills. .

The Suffolk County Legislature and a host of local town and village officials have been working with County Legislator Bridget Fleming (D-Noyac), who leads the Task Force on Community Choice Aggregation (CCA).

CCAs are “local nonprofit public programs that take on the decision-making role about sources of energy for electricity generation,” according to the Task Force Report. What that means is that a CCA is an energy procurement strategy that could enable local communities to choose sources of less expensive and cleaner energy.

But it’s not a slam dunk, according to Mr. Bebon.

In July 2020, LIPA approved allowing CCAs to be created on Long Island rather than requiring electricity be provided through the LIPA/ PSEG-LI system.

PSEG has contracted with one energy service company (ESCO) for residential power users and four commercial ESCOs. It also partners with two green ESCOs.

Besides costs, the need to convert to cleaner, renewable energy sources has also been a focus of the Task Force.

Some area residents and business operators have converted to solar energy, but the Task Force has been trying to identify a wider array of solutions since solar power can’t solve energy costs for some because of their locations. Even in areas where solar power is a choice, it only supplies energy during daytime hours. That doesn’t mean all goes dark at night, but if enough energy isn’t stored during the day, a backup electric energy source would need to be available.

Wind energy  is another possibility, and it works day and night, but is affected by weather conditions.

It’s apparent that delivery of affordable and reliable power to Long Island has many challenges, Mr. Bebon said.

Among them are:

• A limited number of ESCOs licensed to operate on Long Island.

• Difficulty in providing competitive pricing compared with the cost of PSEG power.

• A sales tax that was originally removed but reinstated in 2019 for purchasers of power from an ESCO as compared with PSEG.

• Limited cables to carry energy to Long Island from off-Island sources.

• An inability to combine LIPA bills with ESCO bills so even if there could be a savings, customers would be receiving two individual bills.

These and other hurdles would have to be overcome to make a CCA a practical solution.

As for Shelter Island, what’s difficult in other areas can be more difficult here. Mr. Bebon is recommending a number of steps:

• Task the Green Options Committee with monitoring CCA developments in other communities.

• Establish relationships with CCA advocates in East Hampton, Southampton and Brookhaven to be aware of their efforts, with an eye to the possibility of establishing intermunicipal agreements that could serve the Island more effectively than trying to go it alone.

•Develop a public outreach and education initiative on energy in general and CCAs specifically.

As part of the ongoing Comprehensive Planning update underway, the town needs to integrate its CCA evaluations into the revised plan, Mr. Bebon said.

“With minimal potential for cost savings unless things change,” town officials need to survey the community about its interest in pursuing CCAs or green choices to increase the renewable energy mix. The town needs to determine if there is significant interest in working toward use of 100% renewable energy consumption.

There should also be an exploration of ESCOs or other options to secure financing for energy conservation projects that could render “a real payback,” Mr. Bebon said.