WEBVTT

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Any comment from those in the room first, and then we'll open it to folks who might be online. Hard to stand at the podium, but otherwise the rules are the same.

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Uh, then we'll come back to the board for discussion and possible action.

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So with that, Joanne, if you'd like to make your presentation.

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Good evening. Chair and board members. I'm bringing you the gas ordinance 0279 tonight.

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That was an overview. So our gas rate consists of three components. We have a monthly service charge. We have a fixed charge per third, and then we have our cost of gas pass through Perth, which is our variable rate. We also get a discount of.

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0.586. That's part of an improvement. This next slide is showing our customer base. I have it split. It's a five-year average. Everything with this gas rate has a 5-year average, whether it's customer count, um, usage revenue projections. So this one is splitting the residential commercial, county and schools between Los Alamos and White Rock.

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And then the second. or box below is our meter size. Um, we have, obviously, a large amount of our residential customers. Um, our small meter, and then we have our commercial, our county, and our school.

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account. So, um… the this is our consumption versus our actual. So the blue is the amount that we budgeted. So we started in Fy. 21. We're showing through 26.

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Um, and then the orange is the actual, um, sales of therms. So, um.

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In Fy 26, that's our projected sales. So we budgeted for 8.4 million therms this fiscal year due to some warm weather and different factors. We're projecting only about 6.6 million therms sold this.

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this fiscal year. With that said.

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Our projected sales have obviously been lower. Um, so we budgeted for about $8.36 million of revenues. It's projected that we will only make about 5.9 million in revenue. So that's about 2.5.

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2.45 million less than we had projected at the beginning of the year or at the beginning of last year.

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Um, when we completed our audited, um. Ash was projected for FY or I'm sorry, our audited cash showed in FY 25 a loss of $489,000 when we finished FY 25.

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Let's see. Let's go to the next slide.

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So here comes the proposed rate. So so the 1st graph on the top is showing our service charge. So that's our monthly service fee.

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Right now we charge $4. I mean, $14.25 for looking at an 8% increase and for those. And so for the for small, it's going to 1553, starting in July of this year.

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In 1693, in July of 27, the large meter is going from 4125 per month to $44.96 and then up to $49.01 per month.

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Um, and our fixed charge is going from 34 sets to 48 cents to 58 cents.

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Keep in mind, this is the fixed charge. The.

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The variable is based on the cost of gas. So that depends on how much the cost of gas is each month that we settle for the county and schools. Again, it's showing the 1425 and the same percentage for the small and large meter.

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And then the fixed charge for our county and schools is 30 cents currently. It's going up to 43 cents in July of this year, and then 53 cents in July of 27.

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So this is a present like what we calculate for a typical bill for a residential customer. Now.

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everything that's above the blue from fiscal year 27 above is being calculated at 75 cents per therm for the typical bill through our 5-year projection. I mean, our 5-year looking back at 5 years.

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It's showing that the average customer is using more about 70 therms per month. So 27 and 28, we're calculating those based on the 70 therms and not the 75 therms as we had previously.

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And so the estimated cost of gas at 70 therms, assuming the cost of gas is at about 42 cents per therm. Currently, now the average bill would be 5320 at 70 therms, or the cost of gas would be 5320.

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$63 in July and $70 next year. Your bill will go from 67.45 to 78 53, and then 8693.

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So this is our our 10 year forecast. This is what we brought to.

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new board, and we presented to Council a couple of weeks ago. So, um.

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So the current proposed 27% increase is to help restore the gas funds, because we did end 25 in a negative cash, and we're projecting to end 27 and negative cash.

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Um, so we're trying to bring that up to a sustainable level to maintain our operations and also fund essential repairs, replacements, and our long-term cash reserves.

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Now, in 27, we're projecting… we are proposing a 27% increase in 28, a 5% increase and.

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Faced with those two. proposed rates increases. We're looking at a 3% from 29 to 36.

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And with this rate increases, we're looking at getting our reserves fully funded.

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in about 2032.

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So this is our 10-year forecast based on our budget. And.

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This is showing our operations, their interdepartmental charges, our capital improvement projects for the gas fund, projected cash balances, our revenue transfer, the cost of gas, and then it includes our revenue and proceeds and any.

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cash reserves.

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The next slide we we look at our neighboring communities and do some comparisons. We look at.

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New Mexico Gas Company and the Zia National Gas Company.

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And so. And that we haven't set it like 50, 75 therms, 100 therms, and 150 therms to kind of show where where would we be at? And, um… our neighboring communities.

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So that is the end of my presentation. Some questions?

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Thank you, Joanne. What about questions for clarifying questions?

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So if you go back to the previous slide, the last with the neighboring communities, just the.

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just to make sure I'm understanding the so so blue, red, green. That's the current. The 27 proposed and the 28 proposed for almost county on.

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different usage bins. So our neighboring communities, Xia Natural Gas and New Mexico are where the lines are substantial. Well, not substantial, somewhat lower than all three of those columns.

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Yeah, the blue is indicating what we are, what would be now 2827 is a red for us, and the green is 28, and then the top blue line is the natural gas, and the purple line across is New Mexico Gas Company.

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Okay, so just to be painfully obvious, like so in 28 the green will will be at 65 ish or something.

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and then Zia would be, or let's say Zia, New Mexico would be somewhere around 45. Yeah. Okay.

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Thank you. We could stay on the slide, though. You saw something like this. You commented that we don't know what Zia and New Mexico gas are planning to do. They may be increasing their rates as well. When we when we calculated these, these were based as of June of last year. So these were the rates based as of June of 2025.

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It was possible those that right right we give our rates from our neighboring communities usually around their June rates. And so we kind of use that when we're doing our budget preparations.

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So yeah, they're all almost a year old for weeks. So I don't know what their current rates are moment.

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So those two. Yeah, exactly.

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Do you have any insight at all into what they are thinking of doing, or communities are thinking. Is everybody kind of looking in.

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rate increases of one kind or another, or what? Just any sense? No, I have no clue. I'm not sure. Just do you have anything? No. Yeah, we just look at the rates and use as a as a neighboring benchmark. Yeah.

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Do they also, just out of curiosity, do they have a it partitioned into a fixed charge, a charge and a variable charge as well. Yes, they all have similar kind of structure as we do.

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Do you know in a percentage basis whether they're fixed charges or.

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kind of the percentage as hours of a total bill or higher or lower.

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Um, I don't have that information offhand. I can pull it from my computer, but I don't have it with me. I'm sorry.

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I'm happy to do that if you want me to.

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Yeah, that's okay. So back on the consumption slide. So the number 4 in this slide deck.

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So in this case, for 21, 2223, the actual is higher than the budget for the more recent years. But then, if you look at the next slide for sales, all but one year, all but 2021.

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the sales are failing to meet budget. And I'm just wondering if that.

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So if we're trying to understand why we need to do such a big jump in our rates, right? Just looking at comparing these two slides maybe help us understand that. So to basically, um, you know, our consumption was.

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Higher than the budget. But if you look at the next slide for 22 and 23.

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The sale revenue sales revenue was actually lower, more akin to the more recent years. So.

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We weren't getting the right sales. I mean, so maybe we weren't charging the right rates. Is that one way to look at it? That our rates were not high enough, we had adequate sales, but the value, the amount brought in by those sales adequate.

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and this is just like snowballing down the line. Yeah, it's kind of showing that, and I think sometimes when we budget our sales, it's it's almost like a mix of all of the different rates. And so sometimes it's not… And I'm sorry, I should have corrected this slide. I realize when I got up here that I didn't that before. So there. So the members of the public, there should be a digital 3 numbers after the last comma.

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Sorry about that. I forgot that that was wrong, and I didn't update it this month, so, um, yeah, I believe that's okay, just looking at the bars. Yeah, yeah. Zeros at the end. Yeah, yeah.

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No, it just seemed interesting to me that even in the years where you know the consumption was.

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good in the sales sense. The budget getting dollars in say something about that. Yeah. So we've been going through all of the budgets.

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You know, and looking at where things are spent and what we're doing. And gas is kind of an interesting utility because no matter what.

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We have to do work on it. It's in great shape, and because it's a regulated utility, it's like owning a nuclear facility. We… no matter what, we can't turn our back on it. We have all these… procedures and things we have to do, whether we know it's in perfect shape, but we have to do it, and it has to be done by our top senior pipefitters. So no matter what, we have to use the most expensive.

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people within our department to do these things. So.

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In the past, we were we were constantly shifting everybody around, and we'd have waterline break. You'd just like grab whoever was available, and then you'd kind of turn your back on the gas system a little bit, because it wasn't.

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It wasn't presenting any problems, but we can no longer really do that. So every day there are our top paid guys working on the gas system. So that actually started to show up in our budget numbers, I think, significantly like last year.

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We don't have fewer… nobody's really getting off the gas, so just people, there's this kind of myth that there are fewer gas customers paying for it. That's actually not the case. We've actually added customers. And so… you know, there's meters and all of that kind of stuff. Same deal. The top senior pipe fitters have to do all of that work. So that actually hits our budget more within these past 2 or 3 years. Yeah, that's a big part of it. What about? Let's take.

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Just to follow Jen's point on 23. You got it up here. We actually consumed, you know, a million and a half more therms than was predicted, right? Yeah. And yet, if you go to the next slide, you can see we brought in. We actually spent more, you know, $3 million more, three and a half million dollars more.

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about $3 million more, right? Then was or sorry. No, we sales are lower. Yeah, our sales are lower.

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So sorry, how does that turn? How does that relate to what you were saying?

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So so this is actually an interesting thing. We also talked about this. What? What is happening here? And really, it has to do with.

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you know, over the past few years, our guys are seeing a lot of people actually replacing old furnaces and boilers with more high efficiency gas appliances. Now, there are there are some shifts within people's homes, like people are using more induction stoves, so they're getting off of.

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off of gas cooking. So that's a big change that's occurring across the board here in town and nationwide. But, you know, it's just, uh… you know, our original government-built houses had hardly any insulation. Roofs barely had any insulation, and, you know, it was just like…

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Gas was super cheap, so they just heated them with whatever. And now, people are… are making big.

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Pam said.

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energy efficient homes, you know, you just see a lot more window replacements, roof replacements that have more insulation, insulation being actually pumped into the walls of the home and things like that. So.

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energy consumption per capita is going down, and we've had a lot warmer winters, so warmer winters is really a big part of that. No, right. So again, sorry, I'm I must be being thick here, right? Like in 23, though, we actually consumed.

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more therms. If you go back to the consumption, FY23.

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actual consumption was a million and a half out therms higher. Am I is that right?

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You are reading that right? So we're actually consuming more therms. Our sales are less than. So I guess, I guess since tonight we're talking about rates, I was wondering if that has something to do… Were the rates too low? Rates too low is the question. In 23. 23, and.

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Maybe 22. Joanne, is it the cost of gas? Because that's so variable. We've gone through, and there have been some meters that would cut the multipliers, you know, a little color on the gas in 23. Remember, we had the the super freeze in Texas.

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That supply disruption, the cost of gas. Skyrocketed 5 to 10 times what was normal. We actually spent the whole year's budget in one month.

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of the cost. So I think paying attention to the 5-minute part definitely seeing big spikes. We made some adjustments in the budget, thinking, Oh, that's going to be what we're going to see going forward. And then, if we didn't realize that.

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Everything re-stabilizing the cost of gas with them. We're budgeting for the commodity purchase as well as the fixed costs.

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And these bars. So I would we look at budget, it's it's.

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That was just projections at the time. The best information we had.

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When you look at the orange, the actual, that's really what's important. And then with Joe and Joanne had mentioned, what we're doing now is, let's look at the actuals of what people use over the last 5 years, instead of trying to project forward what the market could do.

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He said, let's just do our budgeting based on what people use over the last 5 years. Realize this year.

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The average winter day was 10 degrees warmer throughout the whole year, and so we sold very little gas. The gas fund.

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makes all their money during the winter. We make very. We sell very little gas for hot water heating and cooking.

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Throughout the summer. So, majority of all our gas consumption.

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On the six months of the winter season, and that's that's it. So in this case, we lost this year we lost a season of gas revenues. That's why Joanne mentioned the projections are.

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Was it too? You had it up there. What we're projecting to be short. Yeah, that's the issue is about 2 points still had all the operations to do that Clay mentioned.

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Um, all that fixed O and M costs. We never recovered it through the commodity.

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So that's that's our challenge. So can you go through this chart? Then maybe that's the key thing. So the bottom line is where it's warmer. People are not consuming and doing the improvements that claimant. So they're just not consuming as many therm, right?

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We just start making less money. For a given rate structure. So.

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maybe talk through the slide a little more detail. So yeah, so yes, the revenue is low, but we still have the cost to operate, maintain the system. We have, uh, um.

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our interdepartmental charges from the county. We have capital improvement projects. A lot of these are we've got the cost of gas in there. We have revenue transfer. So some of these.

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things that we can't cut costs necessarily, because we still have to maintain the same size as system.

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And like Clay had mentioned, we went through with the new budget, we went through every single item and it wasn't something we were spending, we took it out of the budget. We were trying to see where we could save some money. But in these ones, so like the blue line, it's kind of just showing how much of.

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The budget is covered. So like the bottom blue, just because that's easier to see. That's how much we spend of our budget on total operations and maintenance. And so that's kind of just showing, like, where our budget is going to. That's looking pretty.

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Constant, maybe with slight increases. Yeah, most of the times, especially when we do budget, generally, if we're not really sure, and we're projecting budgets, we usually do about 3% projected every year, and so that's kind of what this is showing. Unless we know we're going to have a huge expense.

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a huge capital project. We budget for that, but some of, like, the operation maintenance costs, those never go down. Those go up, and usually, right? So we take in a fact that, you know, that those expenses are coming, inflation's coming, so we take.

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an account for inflation costs every year. Usually about 3%, unless we know that there's something else bigger coming. Most of… most of them are flat costs, and so we just increase.

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What about? Let's just say you go up the little thin orange slice total revenue transfer. That seems.

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Yeah, so our revenue transfer is we we take a percentage of our revenue from the gas, and in the past, that revenue transfer would go to the county. Right now, we're doing the revenue transfer and then they're passing it back to us, and we're using it on capital improvement projects with the gas fund.

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So we're working with like public works. So Public Works is doing like a road project. We'll go into that area and do some maintenance or repairs into that area while the road's torn up. So we go in and do that kind of stuff. So we're kind of taking is that almost like a subset of capital improvement, and is it just pulled? It is, it is. Yeah, we just… It's a revenue transfer, because we are, um, we have to transfer our revenue a certain percentage of our revenue to the county, and so we do separate it, because if they stop doing that, then we give that to the county. But right now, when we budget it, we budget, here's our revenue.

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And then we take that, and when we take our budget to Council in April, they they approve it, and then they approve it back to us to spend on some capital improvement costs for the gas fund.

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What about the total independent inter department charges administrative, the gray band. Okay, so those are our costs that we pay the general county. Those are to pay for our services for our attorneys, for payroll, for anything else that the the general county is doing for us.

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Yeah, fleet is a big one on that one. I always forget that one, but fleet is a big one. Did that also go up at 3%?

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That, the interdepartmental charges, we… we don't calculate that that comes from our finance department. They give us the percentage, and we plug those into our budget.

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when they're looking forward in time, do they also adopt sort of a 3% and.

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average inflation rate. I'm not sure how they do, but that's how we do it when we're we're doing our budget. I'm not sure.

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Yes. Yes. Yeah. Very hard to see. The cost of gas is based on our consumption. Is this? This is for the consumption for the next 5 years? The cost of gas is what we actually pay for gas. And so again, we we've looked at the history. Yeah.

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I assume changes in the amount consumed and times some assumption. But cost increase or.

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Yeah, how do we get that number? Well, I'm sorry.

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I want to say we did kind of the same idea. We looked at the what it is and projected out what we thought, and based off also on what we were estimating we would sell as well, too.

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and we use like an average of the cost of gas to kind of predict.

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I'm not that we would spend.

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the whole thing is kind of basically you take where we are, and then you inflate every most things by about 3%, and then you kind of wind up. Is that basically that's basically about that's kind of how you do projection, or that's how we did the projections.

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And that's how we could. We kind of knew.

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So like in previous, some of like the what we expected to sell and we didn't sell. So that's why we went and we really dug into the budget, and we're like, okay, this… We projecting we're selling 8.4 million, but that hasn't even been the case last year. It was budgeted 8.4 million, and we didn't do that either. So I'm not sure why it carried over that way. Um, I wasn't doing the budget at the time. So what we did this year is we took the last 5 years to kind of go, okay, what are we? What are we selling? Where are we really at? So that we could.

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try to match our expenses to our revenue, because we were initially saying our revenue is this high, and we're spending this high, but we're not making.

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much in revenue sales. So we were trying to bring it down to kind of a closer projection of what we really sell.

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And if we were to keep the same rate structure as we have now, just as a thought experiment like, where would our balances be?

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With without any the next few years. Yeah, without any adjustment. If you want to go without any adjustment, just just trying to build the case, like, why are we, you know.

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Well, I mean, we ended 25 with a negative $500,000. We're projecting at this end of the year we're going to be at about 2, a negative 2.3 million. So we do need some to start. We need to kind of bring that up to a level that's sustainable, and also be able to fund our, um.

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reserves that we're not funding right now that we've talked about.

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Yes, that's thank you. I always have. Sorry. It's.

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I know. Not just you. Occupational hazard of being in finance. I've been unable to win this battle, and any of the discussions I've ever had.

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And you're looking at your screen. I'll ask Eric if you have any questions.

00:35:59.000 --> 00:36:08.000
No, I'm okay. I'm, um… I really like this is very, very well done. I appreciate all the work that went into this.

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Okay. Okay. I've got a couple questions here. A different tech. If you go for the time being.

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Um… The staff report.

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says the proposed rate increases for the gas fund are 29% in FY27 and 17% in 28.

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which are really scary numbers. They are. And when I look at the 10-year forecast, it uses it says 27% and 5%.

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What I think I think there's a problem here, though, if you think, oh, it's a 27% increase or a 29% increase.

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That's, as you pointed out originally, there's three components. Right. And I get and and you're only looking when you give. I think you're only looking. That's what I want to confirm.

00:37:07.000 --> 00:37:22.000
Let me use this 27 or 29% number at the 2 components, the surcharge and the fixed charge. You're not including the variable charge. So when a customer looks at his bill, he's not going to see that much of a rate increase.

00:37:22.000 --> 00:37:42.000
Is that correct? That is correct. So part of it is because the service fee we're not raising 27%. We're raising that at like 8%. It's the fixed cost of gas that we're rating to 27%. The variable cost of gas. We have no control over. That's just the cost of gas. Yes, that's the pass-through.

00:37:42.000 --> 00:38:04.000
So, but I did the numbers. using the 70 therms per year I got percentage wise about 16% in the 1st year, and a little under 11%, 10 something for the second year, which isn't nearly as… too, because I did the same, and I have those same calculations.

00:38:04.000 --> 00:38:27.000
So, I mean, those are still bad enough, but they're not bad as as this 20, 29% or 17%. Again, like, So in terms of looking at it as a customer, that's really the kind of rate increase we're talking about for the typical customer and the average month.

00:38:27.000 --> 00:38:39.000
There will be obviously more in the wintertime. Not everybody's a typical customer, but trying to have something to compare. Okay, that was my big concern here.

00:38:39.000 --> 00:38:47.000
that we… that the numbers are not quite as scary as they're presented in some.

00:38:47.000 --> 00:39:04.000
Some ways of looking at it. And the cost is an average, too. So I think we use, like, 43 cents, so it could be higher, it could be lower, and so that percentages could be a little bit different, but that was the average cost of gas, so I'll use that. Are there other questions now from the board.

00:39:04.000 --> 00:39:15.000
Did we last raise rates? I remember there was the whole Ukraine war. That was a different thing. When did? When did we last look at the fixed.

00:39:15.000 --> 00:39:28.000
This fixed rate in 4 years. Okay, so we did a 4 4 year rate increase the last time this total only doing 2.

00:39:28.000 --> 00:39:34.000
If there's no more questions from the bullet. Now I'll open it up to public comment.

00:39:34.000 --> 00:39:42.000
Thank you again, Joanne. Thank you. So anyone who would like to make comment will start with folks in chambers.

00:39:42.000 --> 00:39:47.000
As I said earlier, if you'll be come to the podium and give your name.

00:39:47.000 --> 00:39:51.000
And please limit your comments to 3 min. We appreciate it.

00:39:51.000 --> 00:39:58.000
So is there any public comment?

00:39:58.000 --> 00:40:04.000
Okay, I'm not seeing any at the moment. Going twice.

00:40:04.000 --> 00:40:10.000
Okay, is there any public comment online?

00:40:10.000 --> 00:40:24.000
Chair Gibson, there is public. I think there's public comment online. Page R. If you would like to make public comment. I just did the allow to talk. So go ahead and you have 3 min.

00:40:24.000 --> 00:40:25.000
Yes.

00:40:25.000 --> 00:40:44.000
Can you hear me? Okay, perfect. So I'm Paige Ramsey. I'm just a little concerned about the huge rate increase. I have a great job at the lab. I work 3 jobs. I'm not worried about myself, but for, you know, the lower income family, my sister has 4 kids.

00:40:44.000 --> 00:40:45.000
Um, so…

00:40:45.000 --> 00:40:56.000
Her husband doesn't make nearly as much money that I do, and I'm just worried that we're pricing out these lower income families from Los Alamos, because it's the point where everything is increasing. Oh, you say 10% is not a big deal.

00:40:56.000 --> 00:41:11.000
Well, it's not when it's just gas, but when it's, you know, my electric's gonna go up because of what you guys passed this year, and the gas at the pump is expensive. It all adds up. So, you know, there is this possibility that families in a lower income bracket.

00:41:11.000 --> 00:41:21.000
That don't qualify for assistance will freeze this coming winter.

00:41:21.000 --> 00:41:26.000
Thank you. Is there any other public comment on that?

00:41:26.000 --> 00:41:31.000
Chair Gibson. I do not see anybody else with their hand up.

00:41:31.000 --> 00:41:36.000
Okay. That will close public comment and come back to the board.

00:41:36.000 --> 00:41:47.000
or further discussion. And eventually, potentially action. Can I backtrack a little bit? There was a comment in the chat.

00:41:47.000 --> 00:42:01.000
And I don't… I'll just read it to you. Sure, please. Nina says, can you provide an average gas bill increase for winter months with this increase into 2027?

00:42:01.000 --> 00:42:08.000
I don't know if that's a question rather than a comment. I don't know the proper.

00:42:08.000 --> 00:42:13.000
Response to that.

00:42:13.000 --> 00:42:20.000
What? Yes, that could be done, but I don't think we can do it in real time here.

00:42:20.000 --> 00:42:31.000
We could add that to a FAQ. When it goes to board up to Council next. And then it would also be on the website.

00:42:31.000 --> 00:42:47.000
Does the slide on the typical bill captcha is is 70 therms usage standard for a winter month or a summer month? Average usage for the customer yearly average.

00:42:47.000 --> 00:42:53.000
Obviously, more in the winter. Yeah.

00:42:53.000 --> 00:43:00.000
Okay. We'll thank Nina for that comment or chat comment.

00:43:00.000 --> 00:43:10.000
back to the board for the discussion.

00:43:10.000 --> 00:43:21.000
But he's thinking. I'll say a couple of things. First, of course, the obvious. Nobody likes to deal with rate increases.

00:43:21.000 --> 00:43:24.000
I mean, staff doesn't like it. We don't like them.

00:43:24.000 --> 00:43:33.000
Customers don't like them, and we're all customers. So kind of having to deal with something we have to deal with.

00:43:33.000 --> 00:43:39.000
There are, I can tell about 4 different drivers.

00:43:39.000 --> 00:43:49.000
This rate increase. like almost everything else. There's inflation underlying it. National issue that we're not going to solve for this one.

00:43:49.000 --> 00:43:59.000
As Clay mentioned earlier, and and I think it's significant. There are compliance issues to keep having to meet ever.

00:43:59.000 --> 00:44:12.000
ever longer lists of requirements that get imposed on us from in this case, mostly the State, or some cases Federal doesn't get you any more gas.

00:44:12.000 --> 00:44:19.000
I am not convinced a lot of it helps with the safety, but that's we're all familiar with that kind of a culture where.

00:44:19.000 --> 00:44:28.000
requirements keep getting added, whether they're. really caught whether they're they have a favorable cost benefit ratio or not.

00:44:28.000 --> 00:44:43.000
we have. We have to comply. The reduced usage has been pointed out and while the costs of operating system are basically fixed, that gets spread over fewer therms of gas.

00:44:43.000 --> 00:44:50.000
And finally, one that. We're trying to fix here.

00:44:50.000 --> 00:44:56.000
working from the previous. slides yourself.

00:44:56.000 --> 00:45:11.000
We've been behind. We have not raised rates as much as we should have over the years, meaning that our financial situation has gotten to be somewhat perilous in the gas fund. So we've got to not only.

00:45:11.000 --> 00:45:27.000
Catch up and start charging sustainable rates, but we have to dig ourselves out of that hole, which will take a few years. Although, as pointed out, we've raised the rates now, we shouldn't have to raise them significantly other than for inflation.

00:45:27.000 --> 00:45:32.000
are going forward and and should be able to get ourselves out of the hole here.

00:45:32.000 --> 00:45:42.000
So there are reasons. I know nobody likes it, but that's what it looks like we are dealing with.

00:45:42.000 --> 00:45:55.000
And and and it's yeah, it's a big chunk of the time. It looks to me at it in dollars and cents.

00:45:55.000 --> 00:46:04.000
for the this nominal 73rd usage. averaged over the year for the first year, the increase is about $11.

00:46:04.000 --> 00:46:16.000
And for the second year, the increase is about $8.40. Really round numbers. It's about 10 bucks a month is the increase, which.

00:46:16.000 --> 00:46:28.000
As was pointed out in public comment earlier. Yeah, that doesn't seem like much. But you know, you're getting. Everybody's getting hit with those things everywhere.

00:46:28.000 --> 00:46:33.000
And unfortunately, that is the cycle that we are.

00:46:33.000 --> 00:46:41.000
Oh. So I wish it were different, but that's we've got to keep the system solvent and.

00:46:41.000 --> 00:46:48.000
and running it in a sustainable manner. And this is what it appears we are going to need to do.

00:46:48.000 --> 00:46:54.000
to, uh, to make that happen.

00:46:54.000 --> 00:47:03.000
It seems our tools are fairly limited, right? Yeah.

00:47:03.000 --> 00:47:10.000
Well, we could squeeze on Philo harder to reduce costs. We can do that.

00:47:10.000 --> 00:47:20.000
That's why I was interested in the the I think I can't remember what color it was the gray band was or no, the bottom band, the blue band right was operations and maintenance costs are not.

00:47:20.000 --> 00:47:28.000
projected to increase dramatically, but they were inflated on the standard 3%.

00:47:28.000 --> 00:47:44.000
to reduce them. I don't know. Clay have this one, you know, staffing is a fixed cost. And if you recall to go we had an audit by the public regulatory Commission, and they identified.

00:47:44.000 --> 00:47:49.000
Several things that we needed to do and becoming clients and.

00:47:49.000 --> 00:48:04.000
You'd have to staff up. to do that, and… We have a budget that's… been established over a 4-year term at 2% a year. We fell behind in.

00:48:04.000 --> 00:48:12.000
Here we are today, and then and really the biggest issue was not selling much gas this winter that that really put us behind that.

00:48:12.000 --> 00:48:26.000
Basically, so I can give you some specific examples like tonight you you approved the purchase of the factor. So the vector. That's a that's that's a nice little like cross section of a of a thing that we're looking at.

00:48:26.000 --> 00:48:42.000
back maybe 3, 4 years ago, that vector would probably be 150 to $180,000 less than it is now, just across the board. What everybody's having to deal with the reality of, I mean, look at how much it costs to buy a car. Now it's.

00:48:42.000 --> 00:49:01.000
So much more than it was just even, like, 5, 8 years ago. So same thing with the vector, and the vector gets spread among all of our budget areas, so gas has to pay for part of that, too. So I had to. We had, or we all had to scramble to purchase this one, because next year they're going to be more.

00:49:01.000 --> 00:49:20.000
You see several things coming down the. On the, you know, pike, that's gonna end up causing even more expense. So we, you know, hurried and hustled this through now for a budget adjustment in this fiscal year, so we can purchase it. But if you think about, like, your lives and your work, you know the…

00:49:20.000 --> 00:49:36.000
Our guys also have to go to required training. They have to travel away, right? So travel has just gotten way more expensive, especially on the gas system. We have to send them for training. They might… we've we've lowered the number of people.

00:49:36.000 --> 00:49:45.000
That's like, man, this is hitting our budget. How many of them get to go to a gas conference? And that used to be a a set thing. And it's like, now we're like.

00:49:45.000 --> 00:49:53.000
And then two this year instead of 4. So we've had to do things like that, tighten their belts with stuff like that.

00:49:53.000 --> 00:50:14.000
pipe. We put in… carbon-based petroleum-based pipe now. So the cost of pipe is more, and just you spread that among every single thing we do. That's up to what we're what we're looking at.

00:50:14.000 --> 00:50:21.000
Not all inflation is is that the consumer price index. Only consumer goods.

00:50:21.000 --> 00:50:37.000
a consumer basket. Utility, there's lots of different inflation indexes and utilities is higher in general, higher than the consumer price index. Yeah.

00:50:37.000 --> 00:50:52.000
And the compliance costs grown. I know finally, you mentioned a few years ago there was an audit, and you know that that was a that was a you know that was a step function. Have they? Have there been other step functions in the interim meeting time? Or is it a continuous?

00:50:52.000 --> 00:51:00.000
The creeping growth of compliance costs, or has it been? Does it just jump up and then kind of stay steady?

00:51:00.000 --> 00:51:05.000
Yeah, so Philo talked about the audit that we went through and we had.

00:51:05.000 --> 00:51:11.000
We had some probable findings, and then we had some actual violations, because they were things that.

00:51:11.000 --> 00:51:26.000
That we had kind of like, we didn't prioritize them because they weren't things that were presenting a problem, but they are required. And so, in order to do that, we have to dedicate staff that we had not done before, and so we had to.

00:51:26.000 --> 00:51:43.000
We had to actually dedicate… we had to bring in another senior pipe fitter and create a third supervisor position. We always had two. We have a third because all they do is oversee gas, basically gas compliance and gas O and MS and preventative maintenance.

00:51:43.000 --> 00:51:57.000
We have all these, you know. myriad of things that we have to do on every year, every other year, 3 year, 5 year, and things that we do. We even have to do. They make us go out and.

00:51:57.000 --> 00:52:16.000
you know, operate the system in reverse on purpose to make sure that we have just all these procedures, you know, and so, like you said, there was a step function after this last audit that we went through, where we said, all right, new gas supervisor and dedicated senior pipe fitters to always doing this.

00:52:16.000 --> 00:52:34.000
stuff, whether we… Like, you know, Chair Gibson talked about whether we it really is helping, or it doesn't sell more gas, but we have to do it. So, for instance, one of the things that that we now have to do is go through and and touch actually.

00:52:34.000 --> 00:52:46.000
do something to every single piece of pipe that comes up above the ground. That means every single home somebody has to go back there and and do.

00:52:46.000 --> 00:53:04.000
something to it every year. So we've… so this year, we're painting them all because, you know, any little bit of rust, most iron rust all the way through, it just sometimes you get that little… That can't be there. And so we're painting them all. We actually replaced several of the old meters, and you know, it's just…

00:53:04.000 --> 00:53:13.000
Things like that. And so, like you said, so we had a step function, and now it's just gonna, like, slowly creep up. Yeah.

00:53:13.000 --> 00:53:24.000
and obviously running 2 and a half million. Just that's not going to work. Yeah, it's not good.

00:53:24.000 --> 00:53:33.000
Any other board comments. Their company is somebody brave enough to make the.

00:53:33.000 --> 00:53:41.000
make a motion. Where am I stuck with that? No. I will do that. We'll do that.

00:53:41.000 --> 00:53:54.000
Right? Well, I move that Board of Public Utilities recommend that Council adopt and Los Alamos Code Ordinance number 02-379.

00:53:54.000 --> 00:54:07.000
ordinance amending chapter 40, article three, sections 40 152 of the code of the Incorporated County of Los Alamos rates.

00:54:07.000 --> 00:54:14.000
Okay, the suggested motion has been moved and seconded.

00:54:14.000 --> 00:54:28.000
Any other final. Kathy, please call the roll. Member Hollingsworth. Yes, Member Knockley. Yes, Member Gibson. Yes, Member Stromberg.

00:54:28.000 --> 00:54:31.000
Yes.

00:54:31.000 --> 00:54:35.000
I think you said yes. Do you want to confirm that?

00:54:35.000 --> 00:54:45.000
Yeah, I said yes. I appreciate what you said earlier about all the reasons, and it's a sad yes, but it's a yes.

00:54:45.000 --> 00:54:52.000
We appreciate we're all equal. None of us like it. Okay, motion passes four to zero.

00:54:52.000 --> 00:54:58.000
Thank you, Joanne. Thank you. Thank you. All the staff of working on this.

00:54:58.000 --> 00:55:05.000
For quite a while, we actually discussed this quite a bit during our budget process. This is the.

00:55:05.000 --> 00:55:15.000
Option 3 that we came up with in trying to deal with the with the financial situation of the gas fund. So hopefully we'll get that.

00:55:15.000 --> 00:55:19.000
squared away over time. in just a few years.

00:55:19.000 --> 00:55:29.000
All right. Thank you. We'll move on. on a much lighter note.

00:55:29.000 --> 00:55:33.000
Close to 20 years ago, when I was starting to track.

00:55:33.000 --> 00:55:48.000
energy use in the community needed to get data. And I was referred to Kathy, who had a different role at that time in the department, but she was very helpful in not only digging up consumption reports.

00:55:48.000 --> 00:56:06.000
But explaining them to me very patiently, and. After almost 20 years, I think I almost understand them. But I wouldn't have without without Kathy's help originally. And this is Kathy's last meeting.

00:56:06.000 --> 00:56:22.000
So we have here a certificate of appreciation awarded to Kathy Deanna in recognition of her 20 years of outstanding service in many roles within the county.

00:56:22.000 --> 00:56:28.000
Her expertise, professionalism, and vibrant personality have left a lasting impact.

00:56:28.000 --> 00:56:37.000
We are grateful for her contributions to the mission, vision, and values of the Los Alamos County, the Department of Utilities.

00:56:37.000 --> 00:56:49.000
for public utilities for May 2006, May 2026. Kathy, we're going to miss you. Thank you very much.

00:56:49.000 --> 00:57:05.000
You were the maze would take me. There you go. Thank you for all the service. You earned that many times over. I have some other things for you. Oh.

00:57:05.000 --> 00:57:11.000
We used to have an old award here in utilities is called Essential Peace.

00:57:11.000 --> 00:57:20.000
And… Isn't it a wonderful thing that we're all different? Each of us has strengths and skills to share.

00:57:20.000 --> 00:57:28.000
When you you link our individual strengths together. We're invincible. I can't imagine us without you.

00:57:28.000 --> 00:57:42.000
That's the piece. And then I want to turn the county, give you a leadership coin. Thank you. And leadership.

00:57:42.000 --> 00:57:55.000
We believe in all employees are leaders that they lead best by example, taking initiative and inspiring trust while making things happen.

00:57:55.000 --> 00:58:04.000
for the common good. You made things happen for this department. So thank you. Thank you.

00:58:04.000 --> 00:58:21.000
Next week together that I would say… Love my county career, and it was not an easy decision. It's what I think I think I'm glad I made pretty sure, but it wasn't an easy decision, and.

00:58:21.000 --> 00:58:30.000
you know, I would recommend this job to anybody and you all are just fantastic workers. Yeah, also.

00:58:30.000 --> 00:58:39.000
Close your ears, general county people, but we have the best department. This is amazing. So.

00:58:39.000 --> 00:58:45.000
Thank you. Thank you, Kathy.

00:58:45.000 --> 00:58:50.000
Thank you very much.

00:58:50.000 --> 00:59:02.000
It will be here early tonight to help with this all set up. Had to happen. Well, when things have to happen, it's great to have people who recognize that and get it done.

00:59:02.000 --> 00:59:10.000
and I know other people did, too, tonight. All right. We move on.

00:59:10.000 --> 00:59:17.000
More fun stuff back then, fun stuff in the.

00:59:17.000 --> 00:59:22.000
It's in the eye of the beholder, you are.

00:59:22.000 --> 00:59:36.000
The overview of the ECA process and presentation of the DOE Lac resource pool budget for fiscal years 27 and 28.

00:59:36.000 --> 00:59:42.000
based on the ECA that we don't have. Ben.

00:59:42.000 --> 00:59:48.000
Thank you, Chair. Good evening, the good board.

00:59:48.000 --> 00:59:54.000
The id.

00:59:54.000 --> 01:00:01.000
Not the start of the presentation, but that's fine. Which one do you want, Ben?

01:00:01.000 --> 01:00:09.000
slides. This is all I have. Okay, this is all we have. These are the corrected slides. I take it.

01:00:09.000 --> 01:00:14.000
That's fine. I can wing it. So we've been doing this for.

01:00:14.000 --> 01:00:22.000
40 years now through the ECA, which kicked off in 1985, and has been extended.

01:00:22.000 --> 01:00:30.000
Ever since its first 10-year term, I believe 30 years? 30 years and then.

01:00:30.000 --> 01:00:41.000
Month at a time, yes. So here we are. We're still working under the extended ECA, but we're getting closer to finishing our new ECA.

01:00:41.000 --> 01:00:53.000
But the new ACA will follow the same budgeting process which we have here. In the presentation, it shows a, I believe it's got a 12-step process that we follow for getting through this.

01:00:53.000 --> 01:00:59.000
The Los Alamos Power Pool budget. I won't go into the details of that.

01:00:59.000 --> 01:01:05.000
don't have it here. I do want to. Is it coming? Okay.

01:01:05.000 --> 01:01:15.000
ramble for a minute. Let's a slide that was showing here is a corrected slide that was.

01:01:15.000 --> 01:01:23.000
put in because of an error in 2 rows in this sheet here.

01:01:23.000 --> 01:01:35.000
Who combined resource expenditures both for Fy 2027 and Fy 2028. The 2 columns under the Los Alamos Energy percent.

01:01:35.000 --> 01:01:50.000
And the Department of Energy percent were carried over from the prior year's budget and not updated for this year calculations. So those numbers were corrected months, so 24 fell on this sheet changed.

01:01:50.000 --> 01:02:04.000
which changed the the overall total resource cost. But the allocations of those costs to the two parties under the ECA, the county and the DOE.

01:02:04.000 --> 01:02:08.000
I'm gonna change those numbers, which change the cost.

01:02:08.000 --> 01:02:17.000
chairs for the… oh, here we go. Take my slides. Thank you. Yeah. So nine step process. I guess I added three steps.

01:02:17.000 --> 01:02:41.000
being more efficient here. We'll soon be required. starts off with loads and resources. So the practical thing to do is to say, what are coming loads going to be? Energy do we need to supply the critical loads and all the loads that the the Los Alamos National Laboratory, as well as all the residences and businesses in the county.

01:02:41.000 --> 01:03:01.000
I don't change much over time. Historically. remained relatively flat and dropped a bit during the pandemic, back up to slowly climbing around half to 1% a year or about so nothing really much to speak of, although we are.

01:03:01.000 --> 01:03:16.000
Based upon the studies we've done in the past two or so years, electrification, we do believe have both heating and transportation is going to be coming. It does appear to be a little slowed down, lost some momentum here in the past year.

01:03:16.000 --> 01:03:20.000
But that's still coming, so we're still planning for that.

01:03:20.000 --> 01:03:28.000
But more in a reactive sense. We plan for it, be ready for it, wait for it to happen, and then deal with it.

01:03:28.000 --> 01:03:42.000
So that's where we get our loads from resources or what the generation we have in order to supply the loads, the electrical demands that our customers and the Los Alamos National Laboratory puts upon our system.

01:03:42.000 --> 01:03:57.000
We project those for 10 years out. We don't budget necessarily for the full 10-year process. When we look specifically here, 24-month budget as required under the terms of the coordination Agreement, or NCA.

01:03:57.000 --> 01:04:08.000
We also plan and budget for. supporting Kirtland Air Force Base, Sandia National Lab as a scheduling agent for that.

01:04:08.000 --> 01:04:23.000
We don't generally buy most of their power. We drive just enough power to make up for where they didn't buy enough power through the Western Area Power Administration, or if they have a little bit extra they need to sell, we'll handle those sales.

01:04:23.000 --> 01:04:38.000
Next step is the good. We take the adopter. We create a county budget which covers all of the expenses that the county will incur in buying power and supplying it to through the Eca. To both the county and.

01:04:38.000 --> 01:04:55.000
Los Alamos National Laboratory. We prepare the lack budget for that, and that ties in both with electric production on the generation side and electric distribution, because electric distribution is one of electric production's 2 customers.

01:04:55.000 --> 01:05:12.000
That's how we get our revenue back to pay for all the electricity and services that we buy for generation. Next step is we get a LANL resource cost and capital projections. They, under the Uca, have a share of costs that they.

01:05:12.000 --> 01:05:20.000
incur directly for transmission lines and other systems that provide energy to the power pool and to the county.

01:05:20.000 --> 01:05:33.000
Next step is to calculate the county's resource cost and capital projections. That is, because the county buys most of the electric resources for the pool power pool.

01:05:33.000 --> 01:05:45.000
We need to know how much do we are buying, what assets do we already own that need capital improvements? The biggest ones are the 2 hydro facilities that we have Abiquiu and Elvato.

01:05:45.000 --> 01:06:02.000
Those get calculated together with electric production. staff get together and come up with those values and a whole bunch of other stuff that goes into the capital projections. Then we prepare a budget based on operating procedures, Eca and power purchase arrangements.

01:06:02.000 --> 01:06:06.000
to come up with the 24-month budget that we're talking about today.

01:06:06.000 --> 01:06:22.000
So we're here at step six, presenting the 24 month budget to the power pool. I actually did that yesterday to present that 24-month budget to the power pool operating committee for approval. We're still working through some details. As I said, we made a revision to the.

01:06:22.000 --> 01:06:28.000
Energy allocation factors, so that's going to take a little longer to get through the powerful operating committee.

01:06:28.000 --> 01:06:34.000
So that's why we're presenting it to you at this time, not for approval, but simply as a presentation and introduction.

01:06:34.000 --> 01:06:40.000
The next step will be to present you you for approval that our next meeting here.

01:06:40.000 --> 01:06:51.000
and then that goes to the County Council approval, and then it gets submitted to DOE and NSA contracting officer to implement on their end.

01:06:51.000 --> 01:07:10.000
That gets us through the signing process, the approval process, I should say, to implement that budget and move forward. So all the approvals are in place through step 9. Next slide, please. If there's any questions, please speak up and ask them. Feel free to. So 4 of those 9 steps are formal approvals, right?

01:07:10.000 --> 01:07:18.000
I guess 9 is a submission, but that results in an approval or rejection. Right? Yes.

01:07:18.000 --> 01:07:26.000
hopefully not a rejection. I don't as it has these budgets ever been rejected by any of these people in the past?

01:07:26.000 --> 01:07:42.000
I'm just curious. I'm not aware of that, but I've only been doing this for 8 years, and I've seen changes to the in from input corrections to errors, such as we've done here. I'm not aware of outright rejection. That would be.

01:07:42.000 --> 01:07:56.000
a difficult place to be in, given the. high importance of the getting this budget approved in order to maintain the electric power supply to the county and the National Lab.

01:07:56.000 --> 01:08:01.000
Chair Gibson, are you aware of it? I don't remember any, but I haven't.

01:08:01.000 --> 01:08:09.000
tracked it all for, well, since 1985. There may have been some dissenting votes along the way.

01:08:09.000 --> 01:08:16.000
Didn't prevent passage. It's awesome.

01:08:16.000 --> 01:08:33.000
Next slide, please. So the following tables are all under the term will be happening under the term of the 2026 Eca, which is planned to be in effect in August 1st, 2026. It's a little fuzzy there on the last month of July. Typically, our fiscal year starts in July.

01:08:33.000 --> 01:08:44.000
Well, we've got our last extension under modification 26 to the ECA covers us through July 31st. So partly into our fiscal year.

01:08:44.000 --> 01:08:50.000
One month into our first Fy 27 fiscal year. And before you leave that slide.

01:08:50.000 --> 01:08:58.000
you're making apparently an assumption about the terms of the 2026 ECA.

01:08:58.000 --> 01:09:04.000
Oh. which you know is still a work in progress.

01:09:04.000 --> 01:09:15.000
What some are you? What changes from the current ECA are you assuming, if any?

01:09:15.000 --> 01:09:29.000
You've got to be using something, and I don't know what would… are you using… Current Eca. Or some draft of the OPCA or what are you using?

01:09:29.000 --> 01:09:35.000
As you know, I can't speak to the specific details of the.

01:09:35.000 --> 01:09:51.000
New ECAs, negotiations, and where standpoints are, but I can generalize it to say that largely the accounting practices that are being followed under the current ECA will be retained and continued in forthcoming 2026 ECA.

01:09:51.000 --> 01:10:07.000
So all the way we handle the cost allocations between the county and the side will remain roughly the same. There is additional language in the new ECA to intended to address specific concerns.

01:10:07.000 --> 01:10:23.000
about future resources and risks associated with those future resources and markets, and where those go. But those don't affect the cost allocation practices from an accounting standpoint.

01:10:23.000 --> 01:10:37.000
Chair, this budget does include the foxtail flats project that is in the new Eca. It's not in the old ECA. That's a new resource. The county procured.

01:10:37.000 --> 01:10:55.000
the portal was power. It did get recognized as a proven resource in the OBCA the credits, and not in financially, this budget, this budget recognizes. Well, the DOE will only pay for services rendered. But yes, you're right as far as.

01:10:55.000 --> 01:11:10.000
They approved us pursuing that resource. But this budget represents Foxtail flats and the energy storage. Well, since we're talking Foxtail Flats, you you really need me to do my next question.

01:11:10.000 --> 01:11:24.000
We don't have a business plan for Foxteel flats yet. We're waiting for the ECA to do that. But presumably some assumptions, some some assumptions are made about.

01:11:24.000 --> 01:11:39.000
power is coming to us, us meaning the pool. How much power is going to Sandia Kirtland? How much power is going someplace else? What assumptions are made there?

01:11:39.000 --> 01:11:51.000
about a business plan that doesn't exist. The assumptions under this are that we use as much of the solar. Well, first of all, we'll use all of the energy storage.

01:11:51.000 --> 01:12:09.000
capacity between Los Alamos County, DOE NSA for LANL in the power pool, as well as for Sandia, Kirtland and their pro rata share of the battery system. The energy storage system is fully distributed across the three parties that I just mentioned, the power pool.

01:12:09.000 --> 01:12:20.000
two parties in Sandy or Kirtland. as well. That's the 3 parties that handles the battery side. Talk about the photovoltaic energy side.

01:12:20.000 --> 01:12:27.000
We're Sandia Kirtland has signed up for a. share of that.

01:12:27.000 --> 01:12:39.000
It's not to say they can't take more if they have a need. We, as their scheduling agent, provide them additional power when their generation is not sufficient to meet their needs. A piece of that could be additional.

01:12:39.000 --> 01:12:44.000
energy from Foxville Flats that they haven't signed up for.

01:12:44.000 --> 01:12:59.000
And and that also applies to the county and the national lab under the power pool. If there, if our load rises during the summer, heating is really hot and air conditioning loads skyrocket.

01:12:59.000 --> 01:13:22.000
We'll use as much PV as we can to supply that before we go pursue other resources. So that's… that's built into the… calculations and forecasts of this loads and resource chart here, about how much energy we anticipate being able to use from the Foxdale flats. You'll notice in the pink block there, the first row there, PPA foxtail Flats PV total.

01:13:22.000 --> 01:13:37.000
It doesn't actually start until May of 2020. Is that May? April of 2027. That's when phase one, the 50% capacity of the fourth system is anticipated and scheduled to come online.

01:13:37.000 --> 01:13:44.000
So prior to that, we don't have anything, and then it kicks on, and we start getting the energy from that resource.

01:13:44.000 --> 01:13:58.000
Well, you at that point, we can use as much of the PV as is available. We need the power, and we'll take it all. It depends percent capacity of the Pv. Is absolutely usable by the power pool in San Diego, Kirtland at that point.

01:13:58.000 --> 01:14:14.000
Come July, so the following fiscal year, Fy 2028, that's when 100% of the capacity of the system and the entire capacity of the battery system will come online. We'll see that when we get to the Fy. 27.

01:14:14.000 --> 01:14:28.000
8 slides. And that's when we get potentially more PV in the county and Cindy are alone can use, which is where we have ourselves in the position of.

01:14:28.000 --> 01:14:35.000
needing to just sell, but essentially excess power. Most of that power will be.

01:14:35.000 --> 01:14:47.000
occur in the summer, just because longer days in the summer, you get more energy during the summer, and the PV system just works better than it does in those short winter months.

01:14:47.000 --> 01:15:06.000
can get a lot more energy. Some of them in the winter. So we, even in the winter, there's not that much to sell, even at the full capacity of the project. So when we get to the summer, there will be months when we anticipate, especially if the combustion turbine generator is running.

01:15:06.000 --> 01:15:22.000
and we'll have to mention in a business plan, come up with an approach to most cost effectively sell that additional power. There are other approaches that we are considering. If we could find a advantageous long duration storage system, or even a.

01:15:22.000 --> 01:15:33.000
Another type of lithium-based shorter 4 RSA storage system, and our effective cost. We could actually procure that and.

01:15:33.000 --> 01:15:48.000
save, store more of our daytime power. In fact, we could store enough daytime power to sync the entire 170 megawatt capacity of the facility of the Foxdale Flats PV facility. So that is one approach that we are looking at exploring as well.

01:15:48.000 --> 01:16:06.000
under the business plan examination. Ben, can I ask you just to give not being too dense here, just let's let me let's walk through this chart and make sure I'd like to make sure I understand it. So every number is megawatt hours, right? On this sheet. Yes. Okay. So the first 2 forecasts.

01:16:06.000 --> 01:16:23.000
Lannel load forecast LAPP lack load forecast. Lap. And I look through these numbers. Tell me what those rows mean. Say, so land will load for this is what the laboratory is forecasting for the whole power pool load.

01:16:23.000 --> 01:16:28.000
to be 47, 5001 in July, and so forth.

01:16:28.000 --> 01:16:38.000
And then what? And the second row is what the county is forecasting for the same load. So this is they're they're making estimates of the total load each party.

01:16:38.000 --> 01:16:48.000
And they come up with these different numbers. So, so the first row, the lateral load forecast for the lap is Los Almas part pool. That's the county plus.

01:16:48.000 --> 01:17:03.000
final loads. Doe and NSA loads. Everyone look at it? That's what we get from the DOE. They go and they say, these are all our estimates, estimates for the coming 10 years.

01:17:03.000 --> 01:17:27.000
And they add in our estimate for that, and they come up with a combined total load forecast. As a… sanity check, you know, just validate that their numbers are in the ballpark of where we expect them to be. The county looks at historical recent historical meetings from 1, 2, 3 years, depending on how the loads have changed over the the past.

01:17:27.000 --> 01:17:33.000
And we look at an appropriate time period, average it out, and we say, okay, this is what we've used in the past.

01:17:33.000 --> 01:17:45.000
just as a baseline and say, do your numbers make sense? So that's what that second row is, the lack load forecast megawatt hours for the pool. That's the county's my organization, Electric Productions.

01:17:45.000 --> 01:18:01.000
validation of the as your methodology for validating total load energy needs, and then the laboratory has its method right? And then we say, yeah, they're pretty close. For the most part, they're not that far off. If we look at the total for the year, they're only off by, you know.

01:18:01.000 --> 01:18:09.000
less than a percent. So, we're like, good, that works. And then we use what we were provided with from LANL.

01:18:09.000 --> 01:18:15.000
As our baseline load forecast. You always use the LANL forecast as the baseline.

01:18:15.000 --> 01:18:21.000
Uh, I can't speak to the past. I've only been doing this for 3 years now, um, and yes, we have.

01:18:21.000 --> 01:18:26.000
Uh, we… I do believe in the past there have been some.

01:18:26.000 --> 01:18:42.000
reasons to where some perceived inflation in the Lantle forecasts where they didn't necessarily match reality as we went forward. I believe that has been largely taken out of their estimates. And again, as we see here, the historical.

01:18:42.000 --> 01:18:50.000
comparison and validation against their numbers is pretty close, so we are comfortable and confident in the using their numbers as a baseline.

01:18:50.000 --> 01:19:08.000
So that's what you need. And then each then subsequently below that is what each resource you anticipate. Is this you? Sorry, by you. I mean the county, the department anticipating the generation on or the lab, or who who gets to choose on this one? It's both.

01:19:08.000 --> 01:19:13.000
So when should we, the county says, here's the resources we have.

01:19:13.000 --> 01:19:22.000
The hydros, Laramie River Station, we have historical data. We use that as a baseline. Some of it's kind of based on.

01:19:22.000 --> 01:19:45.000
a validated. estimate of what the past said, and what we think future is going to be, especially with the hydros, just a little bit of a… Yeah, moving target estimation there, based upon what the weather conditions were for last year, how much snowpack did we get, what are we expect in the future, that kind of thing. So those are fuzzy, but we use the historical data. For example, for this year, we said, hmm, it's.

01:19:45.000 --> 01:19:55.000
pretty poor snowpack. We're probably going to have another bad year like we did last year. So that last year's data was our baseline for this coming the coming years.

01:19:55.000 --> 01:20:00.000
and we'll adjust that if we need to, as we do our budget process next year.

01:20:00.000 --> 01:20:15.000
Laramie River Station, that's pretty straightforward. It's just based upon what we had in the past pretty reliable numbers there. Pv landfill. That's kind of a placeholder there until we get that fixed. Yes, effectively 0, but it's still a resource there, an approved resource.

01:20:15.000 --> 01:20:29.000
Boxtel Flax, that's the new one, and this was the new wrinkle in the way we handle it, because now we have a Sandia Kirtland involved as an offtaker in that project, so it's changed our accounting and load forecasting practices significantly for this round this year.

01:20:29.000 --> 01:20:49.000
We'll see it kicking it off in April there. The remaining several items, WAPA, WAPAC firm, that's the hydropower allocation that the county has, following line WAPA DOE firm. That's the… DOEs, hydropower allocation. Again, we're assuming that.

01:20:49.000 --> 01:20:56.000
based upon the poor water flow through Glenkindan hydro plant, where.

01:20:56.000 --> 01:21:11.000
that energy comes from. It's been terrible, and it'd probably be terrible again this year. So we use the same numbers last year, and that should be fairly close. The new items here at the bottom, the PPA day and PPA night. Those arose because of our.

01:21:11.000 --> 01:21:24.000
the nature of our new Pv resources. See, the sun doesn't shine at night. So we have to buy some power. Our battery isn't big enough to handle all that yet, unless we get more storage. So we've calculated on a.

01:21:24.000 --> 01:21:29.000
Monthly average basis, how much energy do we need to buy during the day?

01:21:29.000 --> 01:21:32.000
still have to buy some power during the day in certain months.

01:21:32.000 --> 01:21:44.000
You see all the way up through April when Foxtail Flats kicked on. We're buying a lot of power, and at night we're always going to be buying power until we get more nighttime generation.

01:21:44.000 --> 01:21:59.000
Any more questions on this? Well, until until Foxtail Flats comes on. I mean, the majority source of resource that we have for power is our is our Ppas by a pretty good margin. Yeah, after losing San Juan General Station in August of or September of.

01:21:59.000 --> 01:22:09.000
2022, there was a 30 megawatt resource. That was intended to be replaced by our Uniper deal, our Uniper PPAs went away.

01:22:09.000 --> 01:22:26.000
Subsequently. And so now we're on the market. That's why I come to you at least a couple of times in the past handful of months to seek short-term Ppas, and I'm going to be coming to you again in this month or 2 at the latest for another PPA to cover us until foxtail Flats.

01:22:26.000 --> 01:22:44.000
is operational. When you've done that in the past, I don't recall distinguishing day and night. Is that going to be an issue, or that's entirely new because of the nature of all our resources, all of our resources, except for the PV landfill, which is tiny anyway.

01:22:44.000 --> 01:22:56.000
or around the clock resources in general. Everything runs just 24, 7. Once we start generating, it keeps on until in the example of the turbine. It's planned to run for 6 or 7 months straight.

01:22:56.000 --> 01:23:00.000
Assuming it doesn't have any triple trips where it fails.

01:23:00.000 --> 01:23:07.000
Because of the nature of Foxtail Flats PV, we had to go and calculate this day and night calculation.

01:23:07.000 --> 01:23:22.000
And that's where I said that so there's a lot of… you don't see here, but there are a lot of forecasting and calculations that went into that, calculating differentiating. How long is the day each month? How many hours do we have? How much generation do we have? Looking at the hourly generation for the.

01:23:22.000 --> 01:23:39.000
projected for the solar field across an entire year, hourly, so 88,760 different data points for generation and looking at that and saying, Okay, the battery can take this much. How much do we have left over that we need to either sell?

01:23:39.000 --> 01:23:44.000
By both day and night. I was just curious about CBA purchasing.

01:23:44.000 --> 01:24:02.000
There's no issue doing specific night time. No issue whatsoever. We can get the the markets are flexible. They'll give us blocks. 24 h. Block is by this and by 24 around the clock blocks. That's where we've been buying under the latest 2 Ppas we got. But marketers are they're more than happy to sell you, uh.

01:24:02.000 --> 01:24:20.000
We generally call it on peak or off-peak energy, day or night box. That's not an issue. This is including some of the on-peak and a lot of the off-peak, right? Yes. So this includes everything we need based on our forecast to be whole 24 hours a day throughout the entire year.

01:24:20.000 --> 01:24:36.000
Again, there's some averaging going on when we get to this level here, because it's the nuances. We don't know what date, what the weather is going to be on a daily basis. Temperatures affect energy consumption. So there's averaging going on here. But this is a good.

01:24:36.000 --> 01:24:42.000
representation of where we expect to be.

01:24:42.000 --> 01:24:46.000
Any other questions? Does Eric online have any questions?

01:24:46.000 --> 01:24:47.000
Indicated.

01:24:47.000 --> 01:24:57.000
No, I'm I, you know, I keep looking at Foxtail Flats. I hear that the groundbreaking. Isn't that in the groundbreaking, supposed to be next week?

01:24:57.000 --> 01:24:59.000
That's correct on the 14th.

01:24:59.000 --> 01:25:03.000
Okay, well, I'm looking forward to it.

01:25:03.000 --> 01:25:14.000
give you a report. Alright, let's move on to the next slide. Then.

01:25:14.000 --> 01:25:23.000
It sounds like we're getting into anticipating business plan for Foxtail Flats.

01:25:23.000 --> 01:25:36.000
and it sounds like from what you say. that we're counting on Boxtail Flats very heavily during the day.

01:25:36.000 --> 01:25:41.000
before we've really looked at whether or not we want to.

01:25:41.000 --> 01:25:52.000
diversify our daytime power more than that. Because we're putting a lot of eggs in that basket.

01:25:52.000 --> 01:25:59.000
Why this would be this would be a big part of a discussion for a business plan. But we're not there yet.

01:25:59.000 --> 01:26:07.000
Because we don't have VCA yet. What are you?

01:26:07.000 --> 01:26:16.000
Are you anticipating? dealing with the diversification of sources issue.

01:26:16.000 --> 01:26:28.000
in the daytime in particular. Um, which is part of our… of our objectives, uh, you know, of our strategic goals is to be at diverse sources.

01:26:28.000 --> 01:26:37.000
This looks like it's concentrating source. a lot. How are you dealing with that or thinking about that at this point?

01:26:37.000 --> 01:26:52.000
Great question. Thank you, Chair. So, I've been presenting to the board every 6 months, approximately for the past 2 years, I believe now where we are in. We've called it our irp resource plan.

01:26:52.000 --> 01:27:10.000
implementation status updates. We've called it that. But what it is is it's my division looking at what generating resources can we get that will help us one both diversify and provide additional energy at night when the sun doesn't shine.

01:27:10.000 --> 01:27:27.000
Those resources could be generating resources, or they could be energy storage resources. So we've been looking at everything available under the sun, small modular reactors, micro reactors, geothermal projects. We are currently looking at 3 different geothermal projects, and we have looked at least.

01:27:27.000 --> 01:27:33.000
at at least 3 others in the past that have fallen to the wayside or been rejected.

01:27:33.000 --> 01:27:50.000
We are also continuing to look at thermal resources, even though they don't necessarily meet the spirit and intent of our carbon neutral 2040 goal. They still may be financially advantageous from a perspective, especially with the emerging.

01:27:50.000 --> 01:28:08.000
coming extended day ahead market that we're going to be entering next, not this next fall, but in the fall of 2027, that's going to inject a lot of uncertainty into where we are and how things are priced. Ilo has been talking with me about UMAPs.

01:28:08.000 --> 01:28:17.000
We are a member of the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems. They have entered into EDAM.

01:28:17.000 --> 01:28:29.000
little corner, I think, April, I think. Yeah. It was their kickoff for that. And so they're getting some… some lessons on how that actually works, and one of the lessons is that.

01:28:29.000 --> 01:28:44.000
having generating capacity, not just power, but actually the ability dispatchable capacity where you can turn it on and off when you need to as a resource has value, and it can potentially impact.

01:28:44.000 --> 01:28:51.000
have large impacts on the costs of resources under Edam, and how that is handled.

01:28:51.000 --> 01:28:57.000
So that's one thing we're looking at closely. That's why we might be pushed into.

01:28:57.000 --> 01:29:14.000
Well, looking at thermal resources, even though I guess I said, they don't fit in with the necessary with the spirit of a carbon neutral goal, decarbonization. They may be necessary simply to provide that capacity to avoid capacity penalties and charges under the extended day ahead market.

01:29:14.000 --> 01:29:41.000
So that's a long answer to your question. I hope it answers it. So we are looking at all these other resources. We recognize that we need to diversify. This is a big egg in our nest here, and it's and we… It was necessary in order to secure that. That's the resource that was available to us. It was either take it or leave it, and we elected to take it because it was a huge step towards our carbon neutral goal. And we'll point out.

01:29:41.000 --> 01:29:44.000
under the description of the way our carbon neutral.

01:29:44.000 --> 01:30:04.000
Bull is written and what carbon neutrality means. Oxtell Flats, any energy from that that we resell counts towards our carbon neutral goal as offsetting thermal energy from natural gas or coal, typically. So under that measure, which I don't generally use.

01:30:04.000 --> 01:30:16.000
Generally, I look at how much energy can we use? And I with Fox Hill flats. It's estimated to be approaching 50% of our energy will come from Voxdale Flats. So we'll be 50.

01:30:16.000 --> 01:30:22.000
Never mind the… not including the hydros, or with the hydros, about 50% carbon free energy.

01:30:22.000 --> 01:30:37.000
If you start throwing in the excess power, that gets us much closer to 80 plus percent towards our carbon neutral goal, which is a huge step up. And that was recognized by both the board members at the time and the council members at the time when Foxtail Flats was approved as a project to go.

01:30:37.000 --> 01:30:53.000
So did I answer all your question or is there some additional color I can give to that? Well, it's probably as far as we need to go now. We'll eventually have the major just a big discussion about that I'm sure and look at.

01:30:53.000 --> 01:31:03.000
all the various options and so forth. We're well aware that you're busy trying to research alternatives to geothermal SMR, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

01:31:03.000 --> 01:31:18.000
Yeah, let's go on. Thank you. Quick question. Oh, sorry. Is there anyone in EDAM who specializes in storage that we could sell our daytime stuff to without investing ourselves directly in.

01:31:18.000 --> 01:31:26.000
George, I'm just curious. I'm not aware of any opportunities to.

01:31:26.000 --> 01:31:32.000
that into somebody else's sort of resource storage is still expensive.

01:31:32.000 --> 01:31:43.000
And there are emerging technologies that are. expected to be, once they become commercialized, the lower the cost of storage, but they're not at that commercially commercialized.

01:31:43.000 --> 01:31:49.000
quite yet. Yes, I've been hearing for the past scale and maybe did it better. Yes.

01:31:49.000 --> 01:32:00.000
There are a number of promising technologies, iron flow batteries, iron air batteries, gravity storage systems, compressed air storage.

01:32:00.000 --> 01:32:07.000
Even pumped Hydro is still a thing. It's difficult to make those costs come down.

01:32:07.000 --> 01:32:19.000
But we are continuing to track the pumped hydro storage. There's a couple of pumped hydro storage projects using tech thermal bank storage that are ongoing in California that we're monitoring.

01:32:19.000 --> 01:32:30.000
Do you have a sense of the I mean, what what you would know now pretty well what the finances are, what the when you would decide to build batteries, to build more storage.

01:32:30.000 --> 01:32:36.000
Or to buy a nighttime PPA, I mean, that's pretty definitive number. What do you think?

01:32:36.000 --> 01:32:44.000
Likely to come for false. Getting some battery, the cost is still high.

01:32:44.000 --> 01:32:55.000
When we bought our storage with Foxdell Flats, it equates to approximately an extra $111 per mile hour, just to store the energy.

01:32:55.000 --> 01:33:05.000
So you add on the roughly $40 a megawatt hour from the Pv. And you're up to $150 a mega hour, which sounds high in our market, and it is.

01:33:05.000 --> 01:33:11.000
until you start considering the alternatives of buying a.

01:33:11.000 --> 01:33:21.000
natural gas turbine. And those are in the same ballpark of 120 to 140 plus dollars a megawatt hour. What's the nighttime?

01:33:21.000 --> 01:33:35.000
10 PPA right now is the same price as what we had in our last PPAs in the… the first one we got for March was $27, I think, a megawatt hour, and the next PPA was… was, uh, low 30s.

01:33:35.000 --> 01:33:39.000
right now. Now, that's not to say the prices now are.

01:33:39.000 --> 01:33:41.000
atypically low. Not prices are low.

01:33:41.000 --> 01:33:45.000
Hey, Ben.

01:33:45.000 --> 01:33:48.000
It's ah, Eric. Go ahead.

01:33:48.000 --> 01:33:58.000
Hey, Ben, so you're saying $150 per… for storage, and right I I I get that now. And you're saying the natural gas is about the same.

01:33:58.000 --> 01:34:12.000
But does that take into account the fact that a natural gas plant is going to last about 40 years and battery storage has to be replaced every 20 years?

01:34:12.000 --> 01:34:23.000
If we got into a natural gas unit either through, say, UMS as a owner, a share owner, or through a Ppa of some sort.

01:34:23.000 --> 01:34:38.000
I don't really see that mattering, the lifespan. Yes, natural gas turbine may have a longer lifespan, but unless we actually own the resource ourselves, and are paying all those O&M costs and the cost of financing and decommissioning.

01:34:38.000 --> 01:34:43.000
that aren't built into a PPA. To my mind, it's a wash.

01:34:43.000 --> 01:34:49.000
It's just another dollar for another resource. They're swappable as far as I'm concerned.

01:34:49.000 --> 01:34:55.000
Okay.

01:34:55.000 --> 01:35:05.000
This, by the way, I should have said at the beginning, this is just a discussion item tonight. I'm not taking any action this evening. But we are scheduled to act on this in 2 weeks.

01:35:05.000 --> 01:35:12.000
So please ask any questions you need to get the parity you need to make a decision on our next meeting.

01:35:12.000 --> 01:35:22.000
I don't have any questions on this slide. We'll move on to spend 20 min on it, right? These ones are all fairly similar.

01:35:22.000 --> 01:35:38.000
This is the same loads and resources, similar loads and resources, but calculated for fiscal year 2028. We'll see the significant difference is in the purple boxes where Foxtail Flats is now fully operational. So those numbers have grown.

01:35:38.000 --> 01:35:44.000
and you can see the seasonal variation across them bigger in the summer, smaller in the winter.

01:35:44.000 --> 01:35:57.000
one might expect. WAPA again is just carrying forward our recent historical values, and you'll notice that PPA day pretty much goes away.

01:35:57.000 --> 01:36:08.000
Across the year. We'll have more than enough power to during the day, unless we get more storage, in which case we can use that and reduce our Ppa night.

01:36:08.000 --> 01:36:12.000
Thanks. Any questions?

01:36:12.000 --> 01:36:15.000
All right, let's move on to the next slide.

01:36:15.000 --> 01:36:24.000
The next slide is where we get… I do have a question. Sure. Just back on the forecast. No, yeah, to the 28. There seems to be an imbalanced divergence now.

01:36:24.000 --> 01:36:32.000
between the LANL load forecasting methodology and the Los Alams County methodology.

01:36:32.000 --> 01:36:40.000
83 versus 585. Yes, that's because our forecast took the historical data.

01:36:40.000 --> 01:36:52.000
And so that's kind of our baseline, and that's what we'll work to refine next season coming in the coming year. However, in Fy. 28, Lyle is forecasting standing up a new supercomputing facility.

01:36:52.000 --> 01:37:02.000
Simultaneous, they will be operating their existing supercomputing facility. So that adds additional 10 plus megawatts around the clock until they.

01:37:02.000 --> 01:37:14.000
get their new facility stood up and take the old one off. That's what drives that big increase in the lionel forecast. For planning purposes, we use their forecast again with the understanding that.

01:37:14.000 --> 01:37:23.000
We'll re-plan next year if the appropriation schedule for that don't hold.

01:37:23.000 --> 01:37:41.000
So, good question. Thank you. So, let's see, can we scroll this a little bit up so we see the whole… There it goes. So what this is now we're looking at dollars here. So the previous 2 slides were megawatt hours energy. Now we're looking at dollars. Everything here is in dollars, even though the units aren't showing up.

01:37:41.000 --> 01:37:47.000
So we take those loads and resources, and we say, what is everything going to cost us?

01:37:47.000 --> 01:38:03.000
Then we look at all the different charges under the terms of the ECA and accounting practices for utilities and electric utilities. Everything comes as either demand charge or energy sources. Elvato, Abiquiu, Larry River Station, Baba.

01:38:03.000 --> 01:38:10.000
Other purchase power, a big blanket for all the… that includes the night and day Ppas.

01:38:10.000 --> 01:38:27.000
in there in that bin economy sales. If we have excess power, we'd sell Lrs sales. We're projecting to sell all of Lrs because it's in a different regional market right now. That could change, uh, as we move forward, but that's our current plan.

01:38:27.000 --> 01:38:39.000
And then you street down below foxtail Flats, battery storage is there just to get the numbers so we can see what's the cost per equivalent cost for that.

01:38:39.000 --> 01:38:47.000
storage capacity itself, you see on the very end there, per cost per megawatt hour is, like I said, almost $111.

01:38:47.000 --> 01:38:59.000
Energy. which is, uh… 3788, and this is Fy. 27, so it doesn't kick on until April.

01:38:59.000 --> 01:39:10.000
and then transmission cost we have to pay to get the electricity here from wherever the generators are. Lrs. If we have that Pnm wheeling.

01:39:10.000 --> 01:39:25.000
Nora, Jemez, Tri-State. Those are all in there. And then all the other costs that go along. This is similar to what we just talked about with gas. There's administrative overhead costs from the county and the utilities department. There's some costs associated with the landfill.

01:39:25.000 --> 01:39:40.000
And having our dispatch center, which is where our operations happens, both the primary and the backup, where we do our scheduling services for the pool and for Sandia Kirtland.

01:39:40.000 --> 01:40:09.000
We add all this all up, including the summary at the bottom, where it breaks out demand charges and any charges separately, customer charges, which is a funny term. I won't go into that, but you'll see it's zero here. And uh… Los Alamos, but that sometimes shows up with there. We don't have anything for this fiscal year, and Los Alamos resource total. The totals there, and then going down in the last column, you can see the equivalent cost per megawatt hour for each of these pieces that go into this calculation.

01:40:09.000 --> 01:40:13.000
So this is on the county side. This is what the county is.

01:40:13.000 --> 01:40:21.000
County's expenditures are for FY27. If there are any questions, go ahead.

01:40:21.000 --> 01:40:27.000
35, let's just say bottom line, 35.7 million dollars.

01:40:27.000 --> 01:40:36.000
514 and change megawatt hour $70 per hour. That's what county 17.

01:40:36.000 --> 01:40:48.000
Yes. Now, as I mentioned, this is one half of the expenditures. This is what the county expects to spend. If you go to the next slide.

01:40:48.000 --> 01:40:54.000
see what the Department of Energy expects to spend. Department of Energy has.

01:40:54.000 --> 01:41:02.000
transmission lines paths that provide the electricity through their system into the county systems.

01:41:02.000 --> 01:41:10.000
And so there's things that they pay off, such as the SCADA system. They own and operate the SCADA system.

01:41:10.000 --> 01:41:26.000
and other things listed on here, and they have their own piece of Wapa energy that they get. That's at the top there, and then they have their combustion turbine. Generally, we don't pay. They don't pass any of those costs on to the county because it's run as a.

01:41:26.000 --> 01:41:37.000
The behind the meter unauthorized, so it's a special purpose approved resource that doesn't impact the pool. Lowers their load, but it doesn't… the cost of county is not handled under the rule.

01:41:37.000 --> 01:41:51.000
And then, same summary statements at the bottom, and the same cost totals and cost per megawatt hour for the doe. And what they they are spending and contributing towards the pool. They generally fire up the turbine when the accelerator is going. Is that generally the plan.

01:41:51.000 --> 01:42:04.000
So emotionally, that's July through December, I believe. That's not gonna happen this July.

01:42:04.000 --> 01:42:28.000
Any questions? Hearing any. Let's move on to the next slide. This is where we take those 2 prior slides for the county expenditures and the DOE expenditures. And then… That's at the top, all of us both added together for both demand and energy. You see the two line items, Los Alamos Department of Energy in totals.

01:42:28.000 --> 01:42:44.000
What we do is we take those totals for demand and energy, and we apply demand and energy allocation factors, which is dragged under the EPA and the forthcoming ECA.

01:42:44.000 --> 01:42:59.000
And that says how those total pool costs get split across the 2 parties, UE and the county. That's what the revision that I used today changed was 2 of those rows, the Los Alamos energy percentage.

01:42:59.000 --> 01:43:20.000
And the Department of Energy. energy percentage. That sounds weird, but that's what it is. Those 2 rows, the cost allocation percentages were inadvertently retained from the prior year's calculation. So we had to update them with.

01:43:20.000 --> 01:43:29.000
This year's and FY27 and FY28's allocation factors. And that changes the totals.

01:43:29.000 --> 01:43:37.000
in the total column, all the dollars, as well as the cost per megawatt hour.

01:43:37.000 --> 01:43:41.000
The numbers are there. If anyone has any questions, please.

01:43:41.000 --> 01:43:47.000
Otherwise, we'll move on to the next slide. Okay, so the bottom line here is, if I go back 2 slides in my head, don't go back.

01:43:47.000 --> 01:43:58.000
The county expects to spend $35 million right? And then now we're expecting to get about 26, 25, 26 million dollars back.

01:43:58.000 --> 01:44:01.000
That's 26. Oh, I'm looking at the wrong ones on my screen.

01:44:01.000 --> 01:44:13.000
Oh, it's different. Sorry. 26.7. So I'd say 27 million. We expect it. So we expect the lab to give us back 27 million out of the 35.

01:44:13.000 --> 01:44:20.000
the rest. That's their share of the pool is okay. And the balance is what the county is is paying.

01:44:20.000 --> 01:44:25.000
I shouldn't say the county. I should say, well, that's what EP pays, and then gets.

01:44:25.000 --> 01:44:33.000
Revenue back from electric distribution. for that space.

01:44:33.000 --> 01:44:47.000
Next slide. So this is the same way. We'll go through the same slides. There's 2 resource expenditure slides for Fy 2028. The county.

01:44:47.000 --> 01:44:56.000
Same… same calculations. And then the next slide is yet. It's in energy storage.

01:44:56.000 --> 01:45:10.000
Yes, that that is one important point is. This July 2027 is when Foxtail Flats under fiscal year, first month of fiscal year 2028 is scheduled to.

01:45:10.000 --> 01:45:17.000
full 100% capacity commercial operation for both the PV and the battery.

01:45:17.000 --> 01:45:25.000
energy storage component. And so those costs, those full costs are now reflected in there, and you can see they are substantial.

01:45:25.000 --> 01:45:34.000
But the cost of our energy is substantial regardless.

01:45:34.000 --> 01:45:37.000
Again, you can see the cost per megawatt hour for the.

01:45:37.000 --> 01:45:46.000
storage at 110 and 96 cents, and the cost of the PV at $37.88 per megawatt hour.

01:45:46.000 --> 01:46:01.000
Any questions? Let's move to the next slide, and we can go back if anyone has any questions. Likewise, a similar sheet for the DOE resource expenditures for Fy 2028.

01:46:01.000 --> 01:46:06.000
This one's almost identical. The numbers change just because of the forecasted.

01:46:06.000 --> 01:46:18.000
Costs with their escalator built into it. But they don't have any different resources, so for the most part, it looks the same or similar, I should say.

01:46:18.000 --> 01:46:25.000
Next slide, please. And here is the combined resource expenditures for Fy 2028.

01:46:25.000 --> 01:46:43.000
Okay. As you mentioned, the numbers, the same sorts of numbers apply here. The total cost to the Los Alamos for the total resource cost in yellow, that yellow highlighted box, the portion that is borne by Los Alamos.

01:46:43.000 --> 01:46:50.000
customers, and the portion that is. fund through Department of Energy.

01:46:50.000 --> 01:46:56.000
Yeah, it's just fiddling around the numbers. It's basically 0.75% both of these years so far.

01:46:56.000 --> 01:47:12.000
So like 75% customer. Right. You can see the, the energy. If you look on the Los Alamos energy percent and the Los DOE energy percent, those two rows there, um, for July 27 is 20.29% and for.

01:47:12.000 --> 01:47:16.000
Department of Energy at 79%. So that's the energy allocated.

01:47:16.000 --> 01:47:27.000
And then you can see the demand, so they're about there. If you look at the total at the end, it's 82% and 17% for energy.

01:47:27.000 --> 01:47:32.000
while that information's in here. Many more other questions. Please feel free.

01:47:32.000 --> 01:47:38.000
Otherwise, I think that's the end of this presentation.

01:47:38.000 --> 01:47:50.000
Then you corrected some numbers from what was in our agenda doc here. Could you provide those updated charts in either electronically or hard copy or both? Whatever? Yes.

01:47:50.000 --> 01:48:00.000
I did send them in this packet, and they're in the packet. All right. I apologize. I was reading the old ones as well. Yeah.

01:48:00.000 --> 01:48:11.000
I apologize. Thank you. Disregard.

01:48:11.000 --> 01:48:26.000
Great. But this is done every every fiscal year. Basically, the year goes through that 9 step process. Yes, we do that every year and calculate a new 24 month budget.

01:48:26.000 --> 01:48:36.000
Even though it's called 24-month budget. really only applies for the one year, and then we redo that second year of the 24 months taking into account. Yes.

01:48:36.000 --> 01:48:41.000
taking into account the additional knowledge that we've gained in the subsequent year.

01:48:41.000 --> 01:48:44.000
So in 2 weeks time we'll be asked to.

01:48:44.000 --> 01:48:57.000
vote on this. It's great. If you have any questions that need resolution fire away.

01:48:57.000 --> 01:49:18.000
Thank you. My pleasure. All right. Um… both in 2 hours, but I think we're close enough to the end. So I propose we keep on going. Anybody actually?

01:49:18.000 --> 01:49:28.000
Okay, we'll move on to the biennial rejection of rules and regulations fee schedule.

01:49:28.000 --> 01:49:31.000
Which is on page 173 of our agenda doc.

01:49:31.000 --> 01:49:39.000
and this, too, is a discussion item tonight with action anticipated.

01:49:39.000 --> 01:49:44.000
Joanne.

01:49:44.000 --> 01:49:53.000
Oh. Small office. Let's okay. So I'm going to go ahead. It's we're going to do.

01:49:53.000 --> 01:50:08.000
The rules and regulations, but before I'll start with the ev charger presentation, and then I'll kind of go over the changes with that we're proposing or introducing, I should say, I'm sorry.

01:50:08.000 --> 01:50:17.000
So every 6 months we've been asked to bring some updates on the ED charging stations. So, um.

01:50:17.000 --> 01:50:38.000
What I'm doing here. So we have our 2 level 3 EV chargers. One's here at the municipal building. One's in the White Rock Visitor Center. We did the installation of the 2, the 6 level 2 chargers here at the municipal building. I think it started in like November, and it completed in December.

01:50:38.000 --> 01:50:46.000
Um, and it went live on December 31st, so that's, I think, about December 30th, we saw the 1st charge.

01:50:46.000 --> 01:50:56.000
The next page. This is showing our level three. So this is includes both White Rock and Los Alamos.

01:50:56.000 --> 01:51:20.000
The blue box is our the Dpu meter, and then the charge point kilowatt hour. So it's just kind of showing the difference. They're not exactly, but this one showing pretty close based on what we build and then what we were charged by charge point.

01:51:20.000 --> 01:51:37.000
Oh, I'm sorry, that was just lost. This is White Rock. Um, White Rock is kind of holding steady with their customer usage that previous to the Charger 2, or the level 2s being installed. Again, this is just showing what we build on the DP unit.

01:51:37.000 --> 01:51:44.000
You meter versus what the charge point shows as kilowatt hours.

01:51:44.000 --> 01:52:01.000
On the next slide. We're showing the level 2, and when I was pulling this graph together, I know that January and February look kind of off, and I think that had some timing with the billing, and when the meters were read for our BPU meter.

01:52:01.000 --> 01:52:21.000
So instead of changing on the graph, I just left it exactly how it was charged in the billing. But if you take the 2 in the green, the 3,700 and the 8,500 in average, it's about 6,100. So I think that was just a timing error with when we read the meter here at the at the municipal building.

01:52:21.000 --> 01:52:37.000
So I just kind of wanted to point that out. It looks really off, but I think connecting the 2 months kind of makes a little more sense. May both look like March is what you're thinking. Yeah, I think I think if it would have been done properly with the DPU meter.

01:52:37.000 --> 01:53:05.000
It would have, and I could have done that for the chart, but I wanted to keep the consistency of what we… we build in our system, our billing system to kind of show the graphs. So, um… The next slide is showing demand usage, and it's showing the level 3 for both Los Alamos and White Rock and the level 2 and it's staying at about 64 kilowatts for the demand on all of the.

01:53:05.000 --> 01:53:14.000
units there. Here's our customer count, and these are for January, February, March.

01:53:14.000 --> 01:53:33.000
You'll see the level 2, how much customer usage we're seeing. That's the customer count for each of those months. They could be the same customer, but I didn't look at that. I looked at the the count of each time it was used by a customer. So it could be duplicate, could be.

01:53:33.000 --> 01:53:50.000
Philo, who has an EV charger, he could be on there 7 times. So, but I didn't… I don't know if he uses it, but… okay, he might be counted there more than once. So I didn't differentiate the different numbers. It's just the number of times that it was used.

01:53:50.000 --> 01:53:57.000
Yeah, we call that charging sessions. Okay, that's good. I'll keep that.

01:53:57.000 --> 01:54:18.000
So the next page is kind of showing the financial results, which I think all of you are familiar with this. This has been presented before. We are showing a net income loss for our level 3s, and this has been consistent with what we've presented before about 6 months ago, and it hasn't really changed. It's it's.

01:54:18.000 --> 01:54:23.000
averaging about $2,000 a month in in revenue loss.

01:54:23.000 --> 01:54:28.000
I'm just going in the right direction. It was March in particular. Yeah.

01:54:28.000 --> 01:54:36.000
It's showing a little bit, it's not… we'll see in the next few months how that looks, but yeah, it looks that way. It's heading in the right direction.

01:54:36.000 --> 01:54:51.000
That's just be that's because our fixed fees are pretty much constant. Yeah, our fixed fees are constant. So the like the gross revenue and like the service fee is based on the gross revenue. So that's always 10%. That's that's a contracted amount pay.

01:54:51.000 --> 01:55:04.000
charge point. So that'll vary based on what our gross revenue is, and the electric expense is variable. Again, it's same kind of steady, but it's dependent on what the cost is.

01:55:04.000 --> 01:55:09.000
and we go to the next page. This is looking at.

01:55:09.000 --> 01:55:30.000
the level 2 financial results. So this is the 1st 3 months of it. We're still also showing with the current rates that we have a net income loss. Um… I think maybe again, January, February might be a little skewed because of the electric expense that.

01:55:30.000 --> 01:56:00.000
I kept in that first slide. So the 1,600 might be a little bit lower, but the net loss in January might be a little bit higher. So, um… But again, the gross revenue, the 10% service fee is based 10% of the gross revenue, and then the electric expenses variable. But everything else is flat, and all of these. The replacement, maintenance and cellular service fees were calculated based on the contracted amount that we have for these level 2 chargers.

01:56:00.000 --> 01:56:13.000
Joanne, why is the cell service? so expensive for the level twos. Level 3. It's only 28 bucks a month. If I remember correctly, when I was doing.

01:56:13.000 --> 01:56:18.000
There are six of six cellular surfaces on this one, versus the other one only has one.

01:56:18.000 --> 01:56:35.000
It answers the question. Thank you. Thank you. Get out of these million dollar questions and start looking at. Yeah, this is like like small compared to what you've been looking at the last 2 presentations. So important almost lost in the noise. Yeah.

01:56:35.000 --> 01:56:47.000
So this is just our performer level for the level 3. So this is just kind of looking at the average kilowatt hour sold, the rate that we have it now.

01:56:47.000 --> 01:56:58.000
Based monthly, it's averaging about $2,000 net income loss, and over the course of the next 12 months at this rate for the last 3 months, it's looking at a $24,000 loss.

01:56:58.000 --> 01:57:04.000
next 12 months. Remember, this is level 3. The next slide will have level two.

01:57:04.000 --> 01:57:21.000
not as big of a loss, but we're also still showing a net income loss for these ones as well. And so we're looking at like a loss about 1,300 a month, and over a course of the next 12 months, about 15,000.

01:57:21.000 --> 01:57:33.000
The next slide is a question slot. So those are those are. That's the presentation pulling in the level 2 chargers.

01:57:33.000 --> 01:57:45.000
So I'll take any questions, and then I can go over the rates, or I can go over the rates first real quick, because I might stick with this. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

01:57:45.000 --> 01:57:53.000
Okay, so 1st of all, one question might have been that we increase the number of level 2.

01:57:53.000 --> 01:58:09.000
whether that would impact the usage of level 3 at the municipal building. Looks like it did not. No, it actually decreased. The number of the the customer count and the sales for the level 3. Once.

01:58:09.000 --> 01:58:14.000
Level 2 went up, it decreased significantly the level threes.

01:58:14.000 --> 01:58:24.000
Ah. Level 3 usage from previous from previous prior. Yeah, from the previous quarter it did decrease.

01:58:24.000 --> 01:58:33.000
Okay. Yeah. The month of March, for example. Yeah, it stayed steady for those 3 months, but if we looked prior to when they… Right, yeah.

01:58:33.000 --> 01:58:45.000
I'm sorry. Okay, okay, yeah, that would be good to understand. Okay, I can pull that in if we and then the other… I just don't remember when we made the rate change, you know, so next month.

01:58:45.000 --> 01:58:55.000
pattern of getting an update is to try to assess the impact of the rate changes. I believe we changed it about a year ago.

01:58:55.000 --> 01:59:01.000
the EV chargers. Ev charger fees were adjusted in.

01:59:01.000 --> 01:59:11.000
applied in January of 2025. So took it in November. Yeah, yeah, that's what I thought. So it's only 6 months ago. Okay, impact of the.

01:59:11.000 --> 01:59:28.000
You change. 2025. Oh, in 2025. Okay. So do we know yet? Can we? Do we have enough data? Do you think, to begin to understand the impact of the rate of the fee change on usage?

01:59:28.000 --> 01:59:32.000
Didn't have that much data prior to the rich age.

01:59:32.000 --> 01:59:41.000
So… It's it's more a case of set the price to where.

01:59:41.000 --> 01:59:52.000
comparable to the general market price. Yeah. And if we choose to change it, it's it will be because of the performance financials that we're seeing.

01:59:52.000 --> 02:00:14.000
if we elect to change that. And I also think if I remember correctly, when these probably when this 1st came out with the rates, the demand cost wasn't wasn't included. So the projections at that time looked like it would be okay, or when we when it came back and we started looking at the actual cost of the meter charges.

02:00:14.000 --> 02:00:27.000
The demand wasn't included in that. So I think that might have is where we're really seeing the loss because the expense of the demand is is a lot.

02:00:27.000 --> 02:00:32.000
The questions on… EV charging.

02:00:32.000 --> 02:00:38.000
It's on an amazing point to the slide with the revenue and expense.

02:00:38.000 --> 02:00:44.000
So you'll see here gross revenue. That's what we get from Chargepoint.

02:00:44.000 --> 02:00:50.000
and electric expense. You'll see we're tracking.

02:00:50.000 --> 02:00:59.000
or if you'd like to spend some of the gross revenue. And I think that's when Joanne gets into our next slide.

02:00:59.000 --> 02:01:20.000
Third, we increase. the the B for the charting commensurate with the electric grade.

02:01:20.000 --> 02:01:39.000
Okay, so that is. that portion of that. So then here's our fee schedule. So if you go, happy to, I think the 3rd. Yeah, the red ones.

02:01:39.000 --> 02:01:55.000
Okay, so the first section that I'm bringing to you is the level 2 and the level 3 rate. So I'm proposing to increase that by the 8%, which is, um, what… Electric is.

02:01:55.000 --> 02:02:02.000
approved for starting July 1st. And so that's just an 8% increase to.

02:02:02.000 --> 02:02:06.000
kind of bring that up with what we're doing with electric rates.

02:02:06.000 --> 02:02:16.000
And then the second section when I was going through all the water rates.

02:02:16.000 --> 02:02:30.000
I noticed that we have nowhere in there where we have we rent hydrant meters which construction companies use and they they hook it up to our hydrant meter, and they rent it from us, and then we charge them.

02:02:30.000 --> 02:03:00.000
Um, per month. Well, we've been charging $25 a month, and we've been charging the current commercial rate, but there's nowhere in the ordinance or in our rate schedule. It's been… so I'm adding that kind of match what we're currently doing. Um… I'm sorry, there… I made an error in the consumption. It should say consumption per thousand gallons, so I'll have that fixed. I didn't realize that until I walked up this afternoon. So that will be fixed when we bring it back in a couple of weeks. So, I'm just trying to get that on, um.

02:03:01.000 --> 02:03:07.000
our fees so that we're charging accordingly, and there's something there that we can reference to.

02:03:07.000 --> 02:03:15.000
So those are the only 2 rates that I'm bringing to you guys this month.

02:03:15.000 --> 02:03:24.000
Thank you. Questions, comments?

02:03:24.000 --> 02:03:31.000
Eric, you got it. If you have anything on this?

02:03:31.000 --> 02:03:36.000
He's still there, but he's turned his camera off, so I'm not sure.

02:03:36.000 --> 02:03:48.000
Okay. Well, if he emerges from hiding, well. be happy to have you back.

02:03:48.000 --> 02:03:52.000
Since there's no action involved, that's not too big a deal.

02:03:52.000 --> 02:03:59.000
If there's nothing more on this topic, we will still move on to board business.

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Starting with the need to reschedule or do something with our July meeting.

02:04:05.000 --> 02:04:12.000
We don't. We only have one meeting scheduled in July anyway, July 15th. And it looks like we will not have a quorum that night.

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So… move it one way or the other by a week.

02:04:20.000 --> 02:04:29.000
Or we could cancel it, although I'm really reluctant to do that when you have one meeting.

02:04:29.000 --> 02:04:35.000
And so… And I know if.

02:04:35.000 --> 02:04:52.000
that he winds up being reappointed to the board. He's going to celebrate that by being gone the first month of the midterm. He'd be gone the whole month of July, so it doesn't matter as far as this rescheduling is concerned what night we do it, because he won't be here at all.

02:04:52.000 --> 02:04:57.000
So the 4 of us are the the ones that need to.

02:04:57.000 --> 02:05:07.000
determine which night works best for us. So who's going to be here? When?

02:05:07.000 --> 02:05:15.000
So, as I said, I wrote an email. I will be remote either day. Is it remote either one. So you'll be able to attend.

02:05:15.000 --> 02:05:23.000
Okay, good. I will be able to attend the 22nd, but not the eighth.

02:05:23.000 --> 02:05:31.000
Okay? And Eric, if.

02:05:31.000 --> 02:05:46.000
Well, if you can be here on the 22nd, Jen can be here on the 22nd, and I can be here on the 22nd. I can be here either day. That gives us… So we we will aim at.

02:05:46.000 --> 02:05:50.000
Um…

02:05:50.000 --> 02:06:01.000
Get Eric back. X. Yeah.

02:06:01.000 --> 02:06:11.000
Why don't we? really like to have his input on this. Although all if he's here, then I'm.

02:06:11.000 --> 02:06:16.000
growth, and it's obvious. It is only here on the eighth. That's kind of.

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311 and 3 the other.

02:06:26.000 --> 02:06:38.000
Well, we're trying to get Eric back. Why don't we pull a switcheroo here and move on to the other item on the agenda, and then come back.

02:06:38.000 --> 02:06:44.000
Sure. Anybody have a problem with that? Okay.

02:06:44.000 --> 02:06:54.000
well then… Last substantive item is planning for the annual presentation to Council, which occurs July 14th.

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This the the purpose of this tonight is just to gather.

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Topic suggestions. What's present… I've made a first cut at that, which you'll see on page 197 of the agenda doc.

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One thing I know I forgot to put in this is mentioning Edam.

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Since that's a term everybody's going to hear about, we might as well start mentioning it. Oh, yes. My basic philosophy here, instead of the usual kind of review of all the wonderful things that have been done, because the boards exist, and Philo gave a good summary during the budget.

02:07:30.000 --> 02:07:38.000
hearings and so on. I really thought I would focus on the issues that the major issues that we are.

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Uh, that we have in front of us, and some of which will… many of which in one form or another, will wind up on council's plate also. So that's kind of what I have.

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focused on. But if people have different ideas. I'm certainly open to that, too.

02:07:56.000 --> 02:08:04.000
Otherwise I would make up a presentation out of.

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this element of comics. Those things here you don't think we can do that too.

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The costs, right? Costs are just going up and up.

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You'll notice under organizational challenges at the bottom there is finances. That's costs. That's revenues. That's all that stuff.

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I don't tend to spend a significant amount of time on any of these, because it's only a.

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you know, 15 min or something like that. But I want to keep people aware of what's in the mill here.

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or make them aware if they're not aware, which may be the case.

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And some of these we don't know yet. We don't know.

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There'll probably be something to say about Elk Ridge, but today I couldn't tell you what it is because it'll hopefully be a little further down the.

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down the path than it is now. Same is true of Eca.

02:09:17.000 --> 02:09:27.000
It's a minor thing under the electricity, other potential carbon resources, you might say, and.

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Next gen storage solution. Just to put them on the radar that budget.

02:09:35.000 --> 02:09:41.000
or sources that are intermittent, we need to consider also storage.

02:09:41.000 --> 02:09:52.000
Yeah, just just to. Heaven noted good suggestion.

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others?

02:09:57.000 --> 02:10:06.000
All right. Just wanted to mention vase. Development.

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Last action. Awesome. Got it.

02:10:16.000 --> 02:10:20.000
Indeed. Uh, you ever get back.

02:10:20.000 --> 02:10:26.000
Called and he didn't answer. Sending a text also. Thank you.

02:10:26.000 --> 02:10:38.000
All right. Okay. So I think we're done with this topic. If anybody thinks of anything else, let me know.

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and otherwise we'll have a. get better organized draft presentation for the June work session.

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and that takes us back to. rescheduling the July 15th meeting.

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which it sounds right now should be rescheduled for July 22nd.

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Would someone make that motion? Sure. I move that the Board of Public Utilities reschedule the July 15th, 2026 regular meeting to July 22nd, 2026.

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Second. Okay, any further discussion? Now's your chance.

02:11:25.000 --> 02:11:39.000
Yeah. Okay. Um… I guess we probably ought to do a roll call on that, Kathy. Yes. Member Gibson. Yes. And Member Stromberg.

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It's not responding. Motion passes 3 to 0. Okay, that takes us to our final opportunity for public comment.

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Is there any public comment in the room? Seeing none, is there any online?

02:11:57.000 --> 02:12:04.000
No, Chair Gibson, there is none. You get to see that for the last time.

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Thank you very much. We are finished. Thank you, everyone. And we are here.

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or