FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 10, 2016
Media Contacts:
BWL’s View of Lansing’s Energy Future Is Not Very Bright
“Could cost customers millions of dollars, while over committing the BWL to fossil fuels.”
Lansing, MI -- Tonight, the Lansing Board of Water and Light (BWL) held its Committee of the Whole meeting. There are several serious problems with the BWL’s IRP analysis presented to the Board tonight by the Citizens Advisory Committee. If approved by the BWL Board of Commissioners, the recommended plan would put BWL ratepayers on the path to incurring millions of dollars of unneeded capital investment, and would burden BWL customers with paying unnecessarily high utility bills.
In response Brad van Guilder, Organizing Representative of the Michigan Beyond Coal Campaign for the Sierra Club, released the following statement:
“Our experts have identified several serious problems with the BWL’s IRP analysis. These flaws lead to misleading results. If approved by the BWL Board of Commissioners, the recommended plan would put BWL ratepayers on the path of incurring many millions of dollars of unneeded capital investment, and would burden BWL customers with paying unnecessarily high utility bills.
“It is imperative that the Board instruct BWL staff to fix these problems in their planning process before approving any plan so it can avoid going down a path that could be wasteful, expensive, and unnecessarily risky. I would suggest the board look to complete a third party review of any plan before implementation.
“While the IRP does rightly include commitments to invest in clean wind and solar energy, it neglects to set a retirement plan for the Erickson coal plant, and may create more than $100 million in debt for the City of Lansing as early as 2020 in unnecessary new natural gas plants. It also misses the opportunity to include more of the cleanest and cheapest resource: energy efficiency. We could be a community on the cutting edge of renewable energy production, growing clean energy jobs right here in Lansing, but right now look more like a community continuing to depend on fossil fuels for our future. That future does not look bright to me.”
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About the Sierra Club
The Sierra Club is America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with more than 2.4 million members and supporters. In addition to helping people from all backgrounds explore nature and our outdoor heritage, the Sierra Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the health of our communities, protect wildlife, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. For more information, visit www.sierraclub.org.
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