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Ohio Edison briefs commissioners on HB6 credits, rate-case impacts, smart meters and LED street-light options
Summary
Ohio Edison representatives told the board customers will see limited HB6 refunds, a pending three-year planning filing, and the start of smart meter deployment and LED street-light replacements, with residential meter installation expected to begin in April.
Representatives from Ohio Edison (FirstEnergy) briefed the Richland County Board of Commissioners on March 10 about customer refunds, a recent rate-case approval and system upgrades.
Company speakers said House Bill 6 credits will be returned to residential customers as an average of about $22 per month for a 1,000-kilowatt-hour residential customer over a three-month period (approximately $65 total). They said the 2024 rate-case approval will increase an average 1,000-kWh residential bill by about $25 per month and that the company will file a three-year planning application in mid-April in keeping with new planning requirements.
Officials described a smart-meter deployment schedule: local crews will handle commercial three-phase meters and contractor Wellington will install residential smart meters; the company expects residential deployment in Richland County to begin in April with the overall program taking roughly one year to complete. They said residential meter swaps require only momentary disconnects (typically a minute or two) and that commercial meters are often changed without an outage.
The utility also announced an LED street-light replacement program beginning March 1 and asked municipalities to choose preferred color temperatures (3,000K for residential settings, 4,000K for nonresidential). The company said the industry guidance favors 3K for residential and 4K for nonresidential locations and noted that LED fixtures carry different credit offsets to ease the transition for communities previously on legacy funding arrangements.
Utility representatives said the company will notify communities about deployment schedules and that customer communications will accompany work in affected neighborhoods.
