Idaho Falls Utility Board Meetings

October 24, 2019 The Idaho Falls Power Board of the City of Idaho Falls met Thursday, October 24, 2019, at the Idaho Falls Power Conference Room, 140 S. Capital, Idaho Falls, Idaho at 7:00 a.m. Call to Order, Roll Call, and Announcements: There were present: Mayor Rebecca L. Noah Casper Board Member Jim Francis Board Member Shelly Smede Board Member Jim Freeman Board Member John Radford (left at 9:30 a.m.) Board Member Michelle Ziel-Dingman Absent: Board Member Thomas Hally Also present: Bear Prairie, Idaho Falls Power (IFP) General Manager Stephen Boorman, IFP Assistant General Manager Michael Kirkham, Assistant City Attorney Linda Lundquist, IFP Executive Assistant Mayor Casper called the meeting to order at 7:02 a.m. with the following items: Calendar, Announcements, and Events Update: Mayor Casper announced the upcoming Engineering Week, the Chernobyl talk at the museum and mentioned that the Governor’s Broadband Taskforce will not be coming forward with a recommendation. There was a discussion on Pacific Gas and Electric’s (PG&E) rolling blackouts and the industry in general including, the complexities, risks and costs when private utilities are faced with selling their assets to public entities. Mayor Casper talked about the tour of nuclear facilities that occurred in France a couple of weeks ago and how France is storing and reprocessing spent fuel. She said that the International Atomic Energy Agency sent a crew out to interview several facilities including the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS) and created a video to be shown in Vienna. GM Prairie stated that there was a group of about 15 people from Romania at his UAMPS conference in Corvallis, Oregon last week, and mentioned that UAMPS is being careful to keep the Small Nuclear Reactor (SMR) discussion bi-partisan and that the Department of Energy has been pretty efficient behind the scenes navigating the discussion. He announced the upcoming utility trade industry meetings and mentioned that Municipal Services and IFP staff will be presenting at the November board meeting. Board Policy 17-POL-01 Review and Discussion: GM Prairie reviewed the Payment in Lieu of Taxes Policy (17-POL-01) and said that the policy can use some clean-up and everyone should redline the policy for a future discussion in January or February, 2020. He gave the history of how the board had voted on the cap since 2008 and ended up using the American Public Power Association’s (APPA) benchmark in 2016 with a set amount for departments to do what they wanted with the money. Board Member Freeman asked what the hard number amount is and GM Prairie said about 1.4 million and that the desire was to get back to stable and predictable PILOT that follows our historical contributions in order to continue with the fiber pilot and once there is a three-year average, then that would dictate the budget. There was a small discussion on franchise fees. 1  October 24, 2019 Board Member/Non-Council Member Discussion: GM Prairie gave a brief history of boards around the region and talked about citizen review processes that sometimes recommend separate boards from the City Council. There was a discussion on the pros and cons of managing two separate boards or maybe having one board and forming an advisory committee and how Electric puts a lot of demands on its members with meetings, out-of-town conferences and training. Board Member Radford mentioned that the average time a board member serves is four years and that it might be a good idea to create a subcommittee to the board that would train new board members or maybe have someone like Mr. Leto come in and train. GM Prairie thought that it might be a good idea to bring in someone like Mr. Leto to talk about the board’s history and stated that the current Board works collaboratively on solutions and that he will continue to put policies in place to meet the Board’s needs. He mentioned that staff is updating a new board book and that most of the training can be handled offline so as not to use too much of the Board’s meeting time covering training. Mayor Casper added that Mr. Leto was a great contributor and it would be great to pull him back in. There was general agreement though that the discussion about moving towards a proxy to represent a council member on the power board was not the direction the board was interested in moving at this time. Columbia Rivers System Operations Review and Discussion: GM Prairie gave an overview of the 45 million dollar National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) study and Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) of the what is going on with the Columbia River System that some people say is in violation of the Endangered Species Act. They want to wrap-up their study and give some recommendations for alternatives some time in February, 2020. He said that power customers currently pay 85 to 95 percent of the mitigation. Board Member Francis stated that he is not interested in tearing out dams until he hears better alternatives. GM Prairie added that if you look at the Smolt to Adult Return (SAR) rate for the Columbia River, he said it is the same or higher than most all of the years put together on the Frasier River recently, which is undammed. GM Prairie talked about causes for the rolling brown outs in Texas and how they didn’t have the generation capacity to keep the lights on because Texas due to their dependence on wind generation. Northwest River Partners Overview: GM Prairie announced that Northwest River Partners (NWRP) has hired a new Executive Director and has redefined its mission this year from focusing so heavy on litigation to educating people on the value of hydropower. He said that young people think that hydropower can be easily replaced with wind and solar and that there is a lot of work to do to get the facts out to the public. He continued to say that separate funding efforts had been made in the past to produce a number of videos and ad campaigns in the Northwest region over the last three years and that they’ve seen an uptick in the interest in hydro and renewables. AGM Boorman mentioned that we are coming into a new licensing period and GM Prairie said he’d like there to be more focus on youth education, stem plans and plant tours. He’d also like to visit schools with the electricity trailer more often. Board Member Francis offered that the best time to visit schools is August when school is starting back up. GM Prairie reminded the group that NWRP has a Fast Facts information sheet that is a great resource. Resource Adequacy in the West Review and Discussion: GM Prairie played a video on the Northwest Power Pool. He talked about how utilities that plan on retiring coal may cause a gap in their portfolios, which could force them to purchase more on the market. He mentioned the volatility of the market and how energy prices can skyrocket in an energy crisis and said the region had a taste of it this past March when prices sailed to $1000 per megawatt hour (MWh). GM Prairie said that prices are inexpensive in a forward market, so we should look to buy three to four years out and added that there will be more discussion to come in the next months on the energy portfolio. 2  October 24, 2019 Second Joint Powers Agreement with UTOPIA Discussion: GM Prairie stated that what Utah Telecommunication Open Infrastructure Agency (UTOPIA) does for fiber is similar to what UAMPS does for Electric in the share in the economy scale. He continued to say that we have cutting-edge software and would not have been able to get as far as we’ve gotten without UTOPIA. Resolution for BioLogiQ as a Commercial Customer Review and Discussion: GM Prairie stated that BioLogiQ is a new company that bought out the old Print Craft building. They manufacture potato starch into environmentally friendly polymers. They use a lot of electricity and anticipate ramping up to 2MWhs. He continued to say that based on the rate ordinance, any new customer over 1MWh is considered to be a large single load provision and can be a negotiated rate customer, but the ordinance makes sure there is no adverse effect on the other electric customers. Mayor Casper added that BioLogiQ coming to town is a major economic success because they were in Blackfoot about the leave the state and Dana Briggs, the City’s Economic Development Coordinator helped bring them to Idaho Falls. Idaho Falls Fiber Network Update: GM Prairie stated that the utility has a 29 percent signup rate of new customers and that crews are working 12-hour shifts plus Saturdays to stay ahead of the weather. He reminded the group to attend the upcoming Fiber Appreciation Luncheon, designed to appreciate everyone’s hard work and dedication to have completed a successful fiber pilot project. He continued to say that we’re adding six new customers per day and the current wait time is 30days out with current staff but we are working to shorten that time. He said that in future buildouts that smaller, more manageable blocks will be released for fiber. Board Member Smede ask if there was a map available to show our progress across town and where we’re going next and AGM Boorman said that the utility is working on developing a dynamic map and if you go to the website and pre-sign up, it helps us to focus on those areas of interest. He continued to say that there are some factors that drive where we go next and one of them is the need to replace old electric lines. Board Member Freeman said that he likes that we are following demand. Mayor Casper stated that it is good to remind the public that we all own this utility along with fiber. Sugarmill to Paine Transmission Project Update: GM Prairie stated that we are waiting to hear the outcome of the appeal protest on the conditional use permit that a customer filed two days after the deadline and Michael Kirkham, Assistant Attorney said the it was thrown out of court. GM Prairie continued to say that once we get our conditional use permit that construction will hopefully start the spring of 2021. He continued to explain that the benefit of working with UAMPS on a transmission project is that it allows us to pay over time instead of using all of our cash reserves up front. He said that a resolution and long-term transmission contract will come forward late next year. Potential Purchase of Westside Assets from BPA Update: GM Prairie stated that he is continuing to broker a deal and is hoping for a reduced transmission rate from BPA. He announced that Bonneville put out their decision of a 1.5 percent rate increase so they can put more reserves into place. AGM Boorman said that BPA is transferring about 187million dollars from transmission to power. GM Prairie said that he will work with Mr. Cranor on getting out a press release that states that we are not raising our rates because of this BPA surcharge. GM Prairie said there are two items of note from of his recent Washington D.C. trip. He announced there are energy and water appropriation bills and that one instructs the Army Core of Engineers to make sure that power isn’t paying more than usage and there are also instructions to do a cost study of who is using 3  October 24, 2019 the dams. He noted that it hasn’t been looked at in 40 years. The second bill is allowing BPA to pay carbon fees in order to sell energy to California. He added that we want them to sell to California if the prices are higher to help lower our power rates when they have surplus power to sell. There being no further business, the meeting adjourned at 10:53 a.m. s/ Linda Lundquist__________________________ s/ Rebecca L. Noah Casper_______________ Linda Lundquist, EXECUTIVE ASSISTANT Rebecca L. Noah Casper, MAYOR 4