North Egypt News

City of West Frankfort City Council met May 9.

Here are the minutes provided by the council:

1. Mayor Arview Called The Meeting To Order At 6:00 P.M.

Requesting A Roll Call. All Commissioners Were In Attendance Including The City Clerk.

2. The Mayor And Commissioners Of The City Of West

Frankfort Have Called For This Public Hearing At City Hall Located At 605 West Main Street, Thurday, May 9, 2024 At 10 A.M. The Purpose Of This Hearing Is To Answer Any Questions The Commissioners Or The Public May Have Regarding The Community Solar Program Subscription. The Mayor Stated Age Has Agreed To Come And Answer Any Questions We Have Regarding This Program That We Have Agreed Too. This Is Just For City Owned Properties; It Does Not Affect Residents. Brandon Bullard With Age Spoke, And He Stated Community Solar Is A Mechanism By Where Ameren Users And Tax Payers Can Get A Solar Discount On Your Energy Bills Without Putting Panels Up. Community Solar Is A Subscription Program To A Community Solar Farm. When You Subscribe Your Usage To A Solar Farm, You Then Get Credits On Your Ameren Bills Based On The Solar Farm Production. The Solar Farm Will Then Send A Second Bill For The Amount Of Supply Generated But For Fifteen Percent Less Money. We Take Your Electricity Aggregation And Go Bid Those Out To Our Partners, Whoever Gives Us The Best Bid And We Come Back To You And Say What It Will Be. Normaly It Is Lower Than Ameren's Rate To Compare. I Am Here To Talk About The Anchor Tenant, This Will Be A Fifteen Percent Discount On All Of Your Usage, Supply, Delivery And Taxes. We Have Several Other Towns Around Here That Has Signed Up. Small Commercial Is The Same Type Of Program And Is About Ten To Fifteen Percent Off Depending On The Solar Farm We Place The Company On. Small Commercial Would Be A Three-Year Term. Nexamp Does Offer A Residential Program, No Contract Involved, Fifteen Percent On The Discount Off Of Supply. There Is A Link To Sign Up Illinois.Nexamp.Com/Age This Is A Dedicated Link For Customers In Illinois. You Will Have To Be Ok With A Double Billing Once It Starts. Number One Question We Get Is, Where Does The Money Come From? More Often Than Not Just Like Any Other Taxing Body, Or Grant Program In Illinois The Money Comes From All Of Us. There Is A Line Item On Your Energy Bill Called Renewable Energy Adjustment

If You Look On Your Bill. Thank You For Sending Me Copies Of Your Bills. The Property On N. Emma Street, This Was A Pretty Large Ameren Bill The Renewable Energy Adjustment Was On The Bill For $51.00 For That Property. This Month You Have Paid $51.00 On Just That Account Into This Fund That Is Administered By Stated Of Illinois. As Of 2021 The State Of Illinois Has Mandated That Renewable Energy Fund Had To Be Used For Clean Renewable Energy. This Line Item Has Been On Ameren Bills For The Last Twelve Years, If You Can Imagine There Is A Lot Of Money In That Fund. The State Of Illinois Only Releases A Certain Amount Of Money Each Year For Projects Such As Community Soalr. What The State Of Illinois Wants To Make Sure Of Is That Everybody Who Pays Into This Fund Also Has Access To This Fund. If You're A Business Or A Home That Does Not Have Space For Panels, Or Doesn't Have The Money To Finance The Panels, Or Doesn't Have The Sunlight For The Panels; Community Solar Was Born For The Need To Access That Funding Without Putting Panels Onto Your Property. On The Solar Farms There Is A Time Line On How It Works, They Put An Option On The Land, Then They Have Companies Like Us To Get The Usage Subscribe Subscriptions Filled. About Half Or To Sixty Percent Usage Is Under Contract For They Break Ground. The Other Remaining Usage On The Solar Farm Is Saved For Small Commercial, And Residental Subscriptions. In Our Talk With The Mayor, And A Few Others There Was Dicussion On The Mall. We Have Two Savings Analysis For You To Look At, One Is With The Malls Account Included And The Other One Is With Out The Malls Account Included. The One With Twenty-Three Account Is Alittle Over Two Million Kwh Under Management Excluding The Malls Account. This Is A Twenty-Year Term, The Kwh Produced Annually Start At Just Over Two Million, We Put A Two Percent Escalation For Weathering Of The Panels.

We Are Going Off Of The Ameren's Rate To Compare

0.096/Kwh. You Will See Credits Off Of Your Ameren Bill

Once You Are Subscribed To A Solar Farm. Your Ameren Bill

Is Going To Drop Dramatically, And That Usage Will Be Replaced With A Solar Farm Bill With The Same Amount Of Kwh's But Fifteen Percent Less Money. The Bill Credit Value Section, Is The Amount Of Money Projected You Will Be Saving In That Year. The Second Bill Which Is Your Credit Purchase Price, That Is The Bill Coming From The Solar Farm, Next Section Is The Money That You Will Save In That Year. There Is No Cost To Subscribe Your Usage To A Solar Farm. The Mayor Stated These Are Your Projections. You Do Not Really Know What Those Numbers Will Be. Looking It Over, It Looks Like You Are Pretty Conservitive On The Amount You Expected It To Increase. Mr. Bullard Stated We Want To Under Promise And Over Deliver, It Is A Conservitive Estimate We Do Not Know What Ameren Is Going To Do In The Future. Another Option Woud Be If You Are Keeping The Mall That Will Increase It To Thirty-Four Ameren Accounts The City Of West Frankfort Manages The Annual Savings Would Be $53,693 A Year. The Total Term Savings Would Be $1,073,852. Commissioner Howard Stated What Happens If One Of Our Properties Is Not Ours Anymore Due To Us Selling It Or Being Shut Down? Mr. Bullard Stated If That Is A Possibility We Are Encouraged To Keep Whatever Entity Off Of The Subscription. If We Sign Up All Of The Properties, And You Get Rid Of The Mall In Five Years You Will Still Be On The Hook For All Of The Credits You Subscribed Too. You Will Still Have To Pay The Solar Farm The Credit Purchase Price. Commissioner Howard Stated What If We Had A Tornado And It Destoried The Mall, We Would Not Rebuild Is That The Same Thing? The Other Good News Is We Work Really Close With Nexamp, The Only Guidiance I Have With That Is It Is A Case-By-Case Basis. If A Solar Farm Was Hit By A Tornado, Their Will Be No Change For You. Ameren Will Be In Charge Of Your Delivery, No Interuption In Service. There Might Be Interuption In Credit Value Since They Are Not Producing.But Hopefully Not For Too Long Because We Would Take Your Usage And Put It On A Couple Of Other Solar Farms. With Your Load We Will Be Putting You On Two Different Farms. The Mayor Stated We Are Stuck With The Mall For Sixteen Years, So We Figured We Would Subscribe The Mall. Mr. Bullard, I Have A Feeling If You're A Good Customer For That Long, They Will Not Want To See You To Go Away. We Will Work It Out With Them You Will Only Have Four Years Left. The Only Catch Would Be Is, You Will Be Getting Two Bills. The Solar Farms Require Auto Payments. If You Guys' Vote To Do This, I Will Give The Mayor And City Attorney The Contract If There Is Any Changes To Be Made. Once That Contract Is Signed And Turned Back Into Us That Reserves Your Two Or Three Point Two Million Kwh. Then It Would Be Up To Us And Nexamp To Subscribe You To The Farms Wherever They Can. Last Month You Guys Voted To Proceed With It, Borrowing Any Questions To Be Answered. Do We Need To Do Anything For Next Meeting? The Mayor Stated Our Attorney Will Need The Contract Once We Are Ready To Sign That, We Will Put It On The Agenda. Mr. Bullard Stated I Will Send Out The Contract And Wait To Hear When The Next Meeting Will Be.

3. The Mayor Stated I Entertain An Motion To Adjourn.

Commissioner Harkins Made A Motion, Commissioner Warren Seconded To Adjourn.

https://core-docs.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/documents/asset/uploaded_file/4697/CWF/4395143/MAY_9__2024-_MINUTES_SIGNED.pdf