Since we apparently don’t have enough to do, the Virgin Islands Water and Power Authority (VIWAPA, or just WAPA) has decided in the last couple of days to send vehicles specifically to our location to check on the status of our meter. This means that I have to go outside, put dogs away, and interrupt my window washing or plant watering or letter writing to federal agencies, to talk to WAPA personnel.

We have spent approximately $30,000 to install solar panels to generate our own power and for months, the utility has benefited from our generosity by getting clean, free electricity during the day (peak hours) when the sun shines on our south shore home.

Our most recent bill (for some strange reason) asks us to pay approximately $70.00, when in the past three months, our bills have been in the negative numbers because we have been generating excess electricity and letting the utility use it. Our usage has certainly not become excessive in the past 30 days. Why would it? We have not changed our lifestyle to quadruple our consumption.  Also,  WAPA PR person, Cassandra Dunn has told Michael that WAPA is severely understaffed. Interesting, since in the past 2 days, 3 WAPA staff members have been to our house…..

Michael’s letter to WAPA:

Ms. Dunn,

I appreciate your assistance in this matter. We did make contact with Mr. Milligan and had two meetings, first with him and then together with a line Engineer. We presented studies indicating that WAPA’s policy of requiring a manual external disconnect switch for net-metering customers was redundant, and ultimately a liability for WAPA. They agreed in theory, but informed us the policy was set jointly with the PSC and they could not make exceptions until the PSC changed the policy.

In the end, we were told that if we intended to pursue a net metering agreement, we would have to move our meter and install the unnecessary disconnect switch, at /our/ expense, for WAPA’s benefit.

So, we have undertaken to make these changes, at /our/ expense, to meet WAPA requirements. We have consulted an electrician and installed a concrete pillar for the meter at the road. The next step will be to dig a trench for laying conduit underground from the new meter site to the current meter connection at our breaker box, and install the conduit, new meter box, manual external disconnect, and masthead. Finally, we will get both the new meter location and the solar power/inverter installation inspected, then contact WAPA to come move the meter and hopefully install a new dual register meter for net metering. As you know, these things all take time (we’re a little short-staffed ourselves).

Meanwhile, as an act of good faith, we have continued to pay the $5 monthly customer charge, despite a credit appearing on our bill, and have been providing WAPA clean safe electrical power at no charge.

And what do we get for these efforts? The WAPA billing department has arbitrarily decided to estimate our bill this month ( we are not in cycles 3 or 4 and the amount is in no way “computer generated and based on an average of the three previous months’ readings” as indicated in WAPA press release of 3/13/09). We were also visited by three WAPA employees over the last two days (apparently your short-staffed days are over), regarding our “irregular” meter readings.

I find it somewhat amusing that this week, “Energy Education Week”, described in the Avis as “designated in the territory to highlighting and encouraging responsible and efficient use of natural energy sources”, when some in the community are being awarded for “lighting the way” with grant money and the assistance of the VI Energy Office, WAPA chose to start harassing others in the community who have taken it upon themselves, from their own pockets, to quietly reduce their use of fossil fuels (something WAPA itself has failed at miserably).

Sincerely,

Michael Dance
Therese Chretien

I have told Michael that I don’t think we should spend another PENNY to help this utility if they are going to harasss us, but Michael, being the diplomat that he is has begun the process of building a pillar ($$ our dollars), after which we will need to dig a trench ($$) to pull wires from the house to the pillar ($$) and hire an electrician ($$$$$) because of some ridiculous rules that they can’t change right now.
Meanwhile, the tax credits that people are getting for converting to alternative energy don’t apply to us because we did it too soon……

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 26th, 2009 at 2:04 pm and is filed under Rants, St. Croix. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.