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812-865-2229 888-337-5900 BILL PAYMENTS 855-865-2229 TOLL FREE
CONTACT US BY EMAIL
orangecoremc@myremc.coop GENERAL MANAGER/CEO
Danny L. Arnold OFFICE HOURS
7 a.m.–5 p.m., Monday-Friday STREET ADDRESS
7133 N. State Road 337 Orleans, IN 47452 MAILING ADDRESS
P.O. Box 208, Orleans, IN 47452 EMERGENCY POWER OUTAGES
To report service interruptions, call: 812-865-2229 or 888-337-5900, day or night. Please have the phone number associated with your account ready when reporting outages. Please limit after hours calls to emergencies and outage situations. BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Eugene Roberts, DISTRICT 1 Randy Roberts, DISTRICT 2 Danny Easterday, DISTRICT 3 Rodney Hager, DISTRICT 4 Ben Lindsey, DISTRICT 5 Brian Hawkins, DISTRICT 6 George Key, DISTRICT 7 REMC KEY STAFF
Marty Frank, OPERATIONS MANAGER Marcy Bennett, OFFICE MANAGER Larry Pinnick, STAKING ENGINEER Michael Roberts, STAKING ENGINEER Misty Tincher, ACCOUNTANT Billy Chastain, MATERIALS MANAGER Mark Belcher, MARKETING/MEMBER SERVICES MEMBER SERVICES
•Free energy analysis •Budget billing •Automatic payments •Security lights •Home security systems •Medical emergency monitoring •Air evac life team •Water heater and HVAC incentives (requires an EM switch) •Online bill payment options •Interactive Voice Response system . for payments and account inquiries via phone: 1-855-865-2229 •VISA, MasterCard and Discover accepted 4
The power is in your hands Join us for our annual membership meeting June 6 Later this month, Orange County REMC will again hold our annual membership meeting at the 4-H fairgrounds just outside of Paoli. The theme for this year’s meeting is “The Power is in Your Hands”. DANNY L. This year, as in recent ARNOLD years, the meeting will be more a celebration of the cooperative’s success than a serious formal meeting. We will have food, prizes, entertainment, activities, exhibits, and, yes, a short business meeting as required by our bylaws. And, even though the meeting is designed to entertain, educate, and reward the membership for supporting their cooperative, there will still be important issues addressed. The most important of these being the Obama Administration’s decision to abandon an “all-of-the-above” energy strategy for a new, “all-but-one” approach that effectively removes coal from the nation’s fuel mix in the future. My December column addressed this issue because the policy, proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), sets stringent limits on carbon dioxide emissions from future coal or natural gas plants. Now, the situation is worsening because the EPA will soon announce another set of regulations pertaining to existing coal generation stations. And, the fact remains: the new standards are impossible to meet with existing technology. For several years cooperatives have tested carbon capture and storage (CCS) as a way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Unfortunately, the technol-
ELECTRIC CONSUMER • JUNE 2014 • ElectricConsumer.org
ogy doesn’t make financial sense. It has never been used at a commercial scale at a power plant over a prolonged period to demonstrate its viability or cost. In a 2012 Congressional Budget Office report, engineers estimate CCS would increase the cost of producing electricity from coal-based plants by 75 percent. Since the wholesale cost of power makes up the majority of your electric bill, a 75 percent increase in production cost can easily result in a 40 - 50 percent increase in the retail rate you pay. Many Orange County REMC members cannot afford the significant increases in electric bills that this policy would trigger. Because this issue is so important, the annual meeting business meeting will include a request for support from Matt Randall, legislative advocacy manager, for our state service association. Randall will explain the important role REMC members can play in influencing the EPA’s decision on this issue and explain what members can do to help. Afterward, I will again explain the Energy Management and Time-of-Use programs Orange County REMC offers to help members control both current and future electricity cost. The cooperative has invested in technology and equipment that allows members to impact the price they pay for electricity. We can provide, install, and maintain the equipment but only the membership can make the programs work. Please plan to attend the annual meeting to see what you can do to help keep electricity affordable. The POWER IS IN YOUR HANDS! DANNY L. ARNOLD is the general manager/CEO of Orange County REMC.