"market-based" electric tariff for Fitchburg Gas & Electric Co., a combined electric and gas utility. The "Energy Bank Service" for new or expanding industrial customers offers rates competitive with average U.S. industrial rates. Fitchburg presented the new rate offering as consistent with the state's restructuring goals of greater customer choice and access to wholesale market prices, but the DPU rejected the utility's argument that new discount customers should be exempted from any specific stranded-cost charges in the future.
Fitchburg claims no current excess capacity and intends to meet the power requirements for the new wholesale service offering through short-term contracts of one month or less. The DPU ruled that the utility's proposal deserved stricter scrutiny than other discount proposals recently approved for utilities with extra power to sell. Nevertheless, it found that revenues would more than offset incremental power costs, and that separate fuel procurement and accounting procedures devised by the utility would enable the DPU to determine whether the new service offering affected costs for other ratepayer groups. The DPU directed the company to include in the new tariff a statement that the structure and design of the new rate might change as a result of the implementation of a restructuring plan for the utility. Re Fitchburg Gas and Electric Co., D.P.U. 95-75, Nov. 30, 1995 (Mass.D.P.U.).