The town of Cicero, New York, recently took the first step to saving money through Good Energy. During a March 28 meeting, the Cicero Town Board voted to allow Good Energy to study the town’s energy use and demographics to assess the benefits of a Community Choice Aggregation (CCA) program.
“Community Choice Aggregation programs level the playing field for residential and small business energy customers,” says Javier Barrios, Managing Partner for the New York City-based Good Energy. “By increasing buying power, these customers can negotiate for better rates, like large industrial companies.”
CCA allows communities to pool their buying power and negotiate electricity prices. The nearby communities of Fayetteville and Minoa have already adopted CCA programs. The New York Public Service Commission authorized the creation of CCAs in 2015 as part of Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s Reforming the Energy Vision program. New York is the seventh state to allow CCAs, and as a lead advisor of the state’s pilot program in Westchester County, Good Energy has pioneered the development of such programs in the state.
Several communities have already signed up for the program. In addition to Fayetteville and Minoa, the initial municipalities participating in the Good Energy CCA include the Village of Coxsackie and the towns of Cairo and New Baltimore in Greene County.
Cicero is the most recent town to consider joining a CCA, and the town board has requested Good Energy research the benefits and impact of a program of the town, which is about 10 miles north of Syracuse.
“The average home in Cicero has between 1,000 and 3,000 square feet of buying power,” says Edward Carey, a Renewable Commodities Associate for Good Energy. “If Cicero comes together as one, the town has tremendous buying power—greater than Syracuse University, right up the road.”
Good Energy is the No. 1 designer and operator of community energy-aggregation programs in the nation, consulting and managing energy programs for more than 700 municipalities with over 3 million customers in 21 states. Good Energy pioneered community-centric buying and serves about 1 percent of the U.S. energy market—more than any other single energy consultant nationwide. Through the latest efficiency applications and extensive energy-market experience, Good Energy has saved residential, commercial and industrial customers hundreds of millions of dollars.