Special to the Record
The City of Chelsea is pleased to announce the launch of Chelsea Electricity Choice, a group electricity-buying program from the City that will give Chelsea residents and small businesses a stable electricity supply price that is also lower than Eversource’s current Basic Service price, though future savings compared with Eversource cannot be guaranteed. Chelsea received state regulatory approval for the program in December 2023, joining nearly 170 other Massachusetts communities that already have this type of electricity program, including Boston.
“We are excited to announce the launch of Chelsea Electricity Choice, our program for Municipal Aggregation, in the first 100 days of my administration. I was a DPW Commissioner when the City started working on it. I’m grateful for this program came to fruition after several years in the making” expressed City Manager, Fidel Maltez.
Chelsea Electricity Choice changes the price that is used to calculate the Supply charge on participants’ Eversource electric bills. However, Eversource will remain Chelsea’s electric utility and will continue to deliver electricity in Chelsea, address power outages, and handling billing.
The City has recently signed a contract with the energy supplier Direct Energy Services, LLC until June 2026, and the program will launch in June 2024.
For the Executive Director of GreenRoots, Roseann Bongiovanni, “the Chelsea Electricity Choice program is a powerful tool that can reduce the heavy energy cost burden that Chelsea residents carry every day while simultaneously bringing more clean energy into our electric grid”. GreeRoots has championed this initiative along with the City. “GreenRoots is proud to have fought for this program all the way to the Department of Public Utilities’ offices last year, and we are ready to help residents sign up for this program” Bongiovanni said.
Chelsea Electricity Choice will offer three fixed -price options with different prices, depending on the amount of electricity from renewable sources. New participants will be enrolled in the Chelsea Basic option and will receive a price of 12.42 ¢/kWh, which is lower than Eversource’s current residential Basic Service price. Chelsea Basic provides the minimum amount of electricity from renewable sources required by law and the lowest price in the program.
“The Chelsea Basic price is more than 4 ¢/kWh lower than Eversource’s current residential price of 17.216 ¢/kWh, which is in effect through July 31. That translates to a savings of more than $18/month for an average residential customer” Maltez said.
Two additional options provide more electricity from renewable sources and are available by request. Chelsea Standard provides electricity that is 75% from renewable sources for 12.86 ¢/kWh. Chelsea 100% Green provides electricity that is 100% from renewable sources for 13.86 ¢/kWh. Both of these prices are also lower than Eversource’s current residential Basic Service price.
“The Chelsea Electricity Choice program has been a long time coming. In our outreach on energy justice issues, community members have consistently emphasized their struggles to pay high bills and to budget for volatile energy prices. We believe that Chelsea Electricity Choice is a meaningful step forward to achieve energy justice, and we encourage community members to get involved in learning more and spreading the word about this program” said Devin MacGoy, Energy Democracy Organizer at GreenRoots.
For most Chelsea electricity customers, no action is required to participate. In accordance with state law, customers with Eversource’s Basic Service, meaning customers that have not signed a private contract with an electricity supplier, are eligible for automatic enrollment when the program launches in June and will first see a Chelsea Electricity Choice price on their bill in July. The City will mail automatic enrollment notifications with program details in mid-April.
Electricity customers who have signed private electricity supply contracts will not be enrolled automatically, but they can request enrollment online or over the phone. Those with private contracts are encouraged to first check the terms of their electricity supply agreement before making a change to avoid penalties like early termination fees.
Participation in Chelsea Electricity Choice is not required. Chelsea electricity customers have the right to opt out of the program before being automatically enrolled, or they can try the program and opt out at any time with no penalty or fee. Those who opt out will remain with Eversource’s Basic Service pricing. Information about how to opt out will be included in the automatic enrollment notification and on the program website.
In addition, anyone eligible for a low-income discount from Eversource will continue to receive that discount. And anyone receiving solar credits or incentive payments will continue to receive them with no change to how the credits or incentive payments themselves are calculated.
Public information sessions about the program will be held on April 16 at 9:15am at the Chelsea Senior Center and on April 30 starting at 6:00 pm at the Clarks School Cafeteria.
More information about the program is available at ChelseaElectricityChoice.com, by calling Chelsea 3-1-1 (617-466-4209 from outside Chelsea), or by calling the City’s program consultants at 1-833-393-5675.
If you require an ASL interpreter, please make that request via the customer support form on ChelseaElectricityChoice.com or by sending an email to [email protected], and please note that an information session with interpretation services may need to be scheduled on a different date from the general public information sessions.