PSC Adopts Settlement Which Provides Retail Suppliers Shall Not Pay A Capacity Reservation Charge

The Michigan PSC adopted a settlement concerning the natural gas customer choice (GCC) program design at Consumers Energy which provides that retail suppliers shall not be subject to a capacity reservation charge at this time

Under the adopted settlement, which was signed by the utility, the Retail Energy Supply Association, and other retail suppliers in addition to other stakeholders, Consumers Energy will continue to implement a cold weather design factor as part of the calculation of the estimated annual customer load which is used in the determination of the base GCC daily delivery obligations (DDOs), which the utility began implementing in April 2014. The cold weather design factor is based on the incremental sales requirements for a design cold November through March winter as a percent of total normal weather calendar sales, as filed in the utility's annual GCR Plan cases

Consumers Energy will continue to establish GCC supplier DDO requirements on a monthly basis, and the company’s GCC program tariff will not be altered to provide for mid-month changes to the monthly DDO for each GCC supplier.

Consumers Energy’s GCC program tariff will be amended to provide for the calculation of a single, aggregate monthly DDO for each GCC supplier, and to eliminate the A and B pools for each GCC supplier. To correspond with the elimination of the A and B pools for each GCC supplier and the proposed single, aggregate monthly DDO for each GCC supplier, the GCC program Supply Equalization Charge will apply to all GCC supplier deliveries. The GCC Supply Equalization Charge calculation set forth in Section F1.E of the GCC program tariff will be modified to provide that the calculation of the Supply Equalization Charge shall be based on Consumers Energy’s weighted average monthly cost of gas purchased and produced for the month in which the Supply Equalization Charge is incurred.

Section F1.G of Consumers Energy’s GCC program tariff will be modified to adopt the MPSC Staff’s proposal to allow for a +/- 30% variance from the 1/365th of the estimated annual customer load to be served by the GCC supplier for the months of January, February and March, as needed to seek to minimize supplier annual imbalances.

Under the adopted settlement, the parties agree that Consumers Energy shall not be required to charge GCC suppliers a capacity reservation charge at this time. The Attorney General agrees to not propose a GCC capacity reservation charge in a proceeding involving Consumers Energy until at least January 1, 2019

The changes to Consumers Energy’s implementation of the GCC program shall begin for January 2017 GCC deliveries and remittances

Case No. U-17900