Demonstrators protest sharp rise in Juneau power rates

Fri, May 9, 2008
Posted in Alaska News

More than 130 people protested the recent quadrupling of power prices in Juneau this afternoon on the steps of the state capital. In addition to seeking government relief, the Juneau People’s Power Project urged Juneau citizens not to pay the new rates. Rates spiked to 52 cents a kilowatt hour after avalanches knocked out the city’s main transmission lines last month.

John Ryan, KTOO - Juneau

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5 Comments to “Demonstrators protest sharp rise in Juneau power rates”

Carl Burton II on May 9, 2008 at 9:30 pm

Now people in Juneau can see what it’s like to live in Cordova. We’ve been at 37 cents (surcharge included) for the last year. They have a simple fix and will be back to normal in a few months. We’ve been mismanaged for years and will continue until someone steps in and takes our coop over.
Blythe Walker on May 12, 2008 at 11:33 am

I’m rather with Mr. Burton. We here in Klawock paid very high rates for years. At least this jump is only temporary. It’s hard to feel too sorry for them. But it does seem that as a business, it is the power company’s responsibility to fix their own equipment and absorb the cost of doing business. Just because the customers have no choice in the matter, does not make it ok to charge them. If it was a burger joint or a grocery store and they raised their prices like that people just wouldn’t patronize that business. That’s not really an option when it comes to the electric company. I’m sure they’ve made a decent profit over the years and will again when things are up and running.
vincent Hayden on May 17, 2008 at 7:25 pm

The point being that some people have been living with this for years, some even knew before they moved to those locations; For those of us in Juneau it is very sudden, we were not prepared, many could go bankrupt, people are afraid to take their medications because they couldn’t pay the rate increase - they have already started showing up at the hospital. We are protesting in hopes the power company will take more effort in exploring their options for assistance including state and federal. We also want to develop a plan for more environmentally friendly methods of generating energy. Fossil fuels will eventually run out and their use is hostile to our eco-system.
Economist on May 23, 2008 at 1:19 pm

vincent seems to think Juneau is getting its power from non-environmentally friendly sources. Maybe you didn’t hear, but the reason for your high prices is that transmission lines went down to a hydroelectric dam.

Blythe makes an illogical analogy with grocery companies. Tell you what — why don’t we close down the Alaska Highway for a few months, shut down your port, airlift all your food in, and you tell me what you do when grocery prices quadruple. Same situation here.

The power company isn’t charging you four times as much to gouge you. They’re not even charging you extra to recoup the cost of fixing the lines. They’re charging you the high rates, because they’re replacing the lost power by burning diesel in emergency generators. So now they’re paying 5 dollars a gallon just like anybody with a diesel car/truck, to replace hydropower that was essentially free (plus salaries and maintenance on the equipment). If you want your power cost cut by a factor of four, find me $1.25 diesel, and I’ll go and fill up there.

Get some facts, and learn some Economics 101 before going around and looking for a scapegoat. Whether it be Big Oil, or Big Power, sometimes there isn’t one evil corporation to blame things on. Finding a scapegoat just wastes time and distracts you from working on a real solution.
Steve on May 31, 2008 at 11:28 pm

However in this case there happens to be one big evil corporation that is a convenient scapegoat. AEL&P had a contract to maintain those lines for the state who owns them and the power they conduct. For their maintenance they are allowed to charge us for our power which is generated by our dam, and one day they will be thanked for their service by being allowed to buy that dam. Since they ignored warnings that the area was prone to such a disaster and neither insured the lines, nor did they build relatively inexpensive diverters that would have averted this catastrophe, it is their stockholders–the ones who until now have profited from this arrangement–who should bare the expense associated with their negligence, not us.
If the state is unwilling to force them to uphold their contract, then the state should bail them out, not the working class who have no say and no blame. If industry and government insist on forcing the responsibility onto the people then the people must resist.