Title
Approval of DOE/LAC Resource Pool Budget for Fiscal Years 2026 & 2027
Recommended Action
I move that the Board of Public Utilities recommend approval of the 2026-27 Resource Pool budget as presented and forward to the County Council for their review and approval.
Utilities Manager Recommendation
The Utilities Manager recommends that the Board recommend the budget as presented and forward to Council for their review and approval.
Body
The Electric Energy Coordination Agreement (ECA) between the County of Los Alamos and the Department of Energy requires that a 24-month budget be approved each year. The budget process begins with both parties preparing a load projection by month for the budget period. Based on the load projections, the Power Supply division prepares a resource supply projection that matches the available resources to the projected loads and estimates the variable costs for County owned resources and purchased power. Finally, costs for projected generation, purchases, and transmission are allocated to the parties based on the terms of the ECA.
The projected power pool total costs per MWh are $92.12 and $71.04 for fiscal years 2026 and 2027, respectively. Costs to the LAPP participants vary due to each party’s load factors. The projected costs to the County per MWh are $86.43 and $72.88 for fiscal years 2026 and 2027, respectively. This budget was presented for approval to the Operating Committee on May 6, 2025, however, NNSA requested more time to review the budget. NNSA informed the County on 5-15-2025 that their consultant Exeter needed more time to review the budget and Staff has a meeting on Monday, May 19, 2025 to finalize this budget. Staff will forward this to the Board as soon as we can finalize it.
Alternatives
Due to the fact that certain costs are billed to the participants as budgeted (fixed charges associated with the various resources) and reconciled in the next budget cycle, if this budget is not ...
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