Pepco is the most anti-american corporation I can think of. Forget about outsourcing to China, or giving millions to political campaigns to gain influence. Pepco refuses to provide reliable electricity to our nation’s capital in order to make a profit.

The DC metro area is prepared for the worst of Hurricane Sandy. We are told to expect power outages from 7-10 days. Let’s take this slowly and think again. The nation’s capital region will be without power, in the 21st century  for over a week because of a category 1 hurricane.

Pepco has allowed our infrastructure to decay to critical levels. The MoCo Power Power page already has posts about power losses, well before the storm. Pepco also refuses to have adequate staffing to address emergencies, because it will not keep sufficient staff to do maintenance  And the Pepco PR machine is busy working on an already hysterical media, building up just how bad the storm is. The strategy is to make things sound so bad that any pathetic performance looks good.

We see reports about how many linemen are on duty and the 2500 they have “requested” from other utilities. Requested is an important point. Sandy is such a large system, who nearby will spare its workers? But the spin of 2500 workers sounds good, combined with a constant drumbeat of lowered expectations is a crass attempt to manipulate public opinion.

We suffer through these outages because our corrupt utility regulatory system allows a corrupted, anti-american corporation to take our money in exchange for unreliable power that threatens life, livelihood and property across our region.

Storms should not keep our region without full power for over 7 days. Any utility must be judged, not by power losses in a storm, but in its capacity to recover from them. Here Pepco fails and will continue to fail until we kick them out of Montgomery County and provide electricity for ourselves through a Public Power system.

Take a look and listen to WAMU’s coverage of our first meeting Oct. 3 in Silver Spring. 

Our first public meeting on Public Power. Learn about how Montgomery County can benefit from a people-owned electric utility from experts from the American Public Power Association. Wednesday evening, October 3rd. Follow the link for more information.

The MoCo county attorney last year drafted a very discouraging memo on starting a county-owned electric utility. This memo has been held up by county leadership as a bar to starting our own system.

I have concerns with the county attorney’s memo. My sense is it was written specifically to discourage county leadership from taking action on a move to public power. What leads me to this conclusion? No where in the memo is there any mention of the five existing municipal electric utilities in Maryland today.

Here is an example of a RFP for a feasibility study on changing to Public Power. For our friends on county council….

A great review of public power—its advantages and how we can set up our own utility in Montgomery County.

Here is an excerpt of the most recent Pepco investor call. The question is from Maury May from Wellington Shields and was answered by PHI President Joe Rigby, The text is from Seeking Alpha.

Maury May – Wellington Shields

Okay. And then my second question is again on Maryland. And I guess I’m just trying to find some kind of silver lining here. But the date of the governor’s panel, when it was announced, was just five days after the rather punishing rate decision. And I’m just wondering whether once the punishment is meted out, does the governor and the Maryland body politic now move forward in working with you instead of working against you? Or am I just smoking something?

Joe Rigby

No, I don’t think you’re smoking something. I’d like to think that there’s an understanding that one thing leads to another and that there is a point of kind of a reasonable view that we’ve got to be able to move ahead.

Take a look at the list of Pepco campaign contributions. Who gets the most Pepco money? Look and see.

https://docs.google.com/open?id=0Bxw9RrAyCkFuODFqYm9vOHRZYWc

Most people do not want to remain angry and hold onto negative experiences. Stress is not a pleasant and it is healthy to move on. That is what Pepco and the Maryland Public Service Commission (PSC) rely on to manage public opinion—overt anger subsides over time, once a the power is back on.

Pepco Holdings Inc. will ask the Maryland Public Service Commission (PSC) for rate increases every nine months until gaining what it wants. Anthony J. Kamerick, Pepco Holdings’ chief regulatory officer said so on the company’s quarterly investors call. I believe him. While Pepco representatives constantly lie to us, they will not do the same to stockholders.

It is tempting to think there is a short-term solution to the Pepco Problem.

Boulder voted to create Colorado’s 30th publicly-owned Light & Power Utility. It is a win for local control, less coal and energy innovation. The campaign website is here-http://www.renewablesyes.org/

Boulder acted primarily to boost renewable-sourced electricity for their community to have a lower carbon footprint on the world.