HMLP Announces Rate Decrease

From the Hingham Municipal Lighting Plant: Jack Ryan, Chairman of the Hingham Light Board, announced that on Monday April 24th at its monthly meeting the Hingham Light Board unanimously voted a rate decrease for customers of HMLP. “Every single customer, save those renting private street lights, will see rate decreases. An average residential customer will see a decrease of almost $12.50 per month or approximately 10%. Commercial accounts, depending on the rate class, will see decreases up to 24%. Town of Hingham accounts, including the School Department, will see a decrease of over 30%”, Ryan said.

Town Administrator Ted Alexiades reported that based on 2016’s electricity consumption a decrease of that magnitude should mean a savings of approximately $471,000. Alexiades said, “I want to offer my thanks to Chairman Ryan and fellow Board members John Stoddard and Roger Freeman for their leadership on this. This welcome news is significant considering that at Town Meeting we’re voting on a very tight budget. Almost half a million dollars is real breathing room.”

HMLP commissioned the firm ENE, a leading provider of wholesale and retail energy services, to conduct a rate study. After an exhaustive review of HMLP’s finances ENE made this recommendation to the Board. Besides HMLP’s cost of service study ENE has done similar work for several other Massachusetts municipal lighting plants.

Chairman Ryan expressed his thanks to “my fellow Board members, John Stoddard and Roger Freeman, the staff at HMLP and to ENE for their hard work in this undertaking. It isn’t often a utility that already provides extremely reliable and cost effective service can announce such good news. Our three goals over the past few years have been Reliable Power, Affordable Power, and Green Power. We have major accomplishments on all.”

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