How aggregation works
Municipal electricity aggregation is a form of group electricity purchasing. An electricity aggregation program like Beverly Community Electric replaces your electricity supplier, and it changes the price that National Grid uses to calculate the supply services charge on your electricity bill. In addition, aggregation can increase the amount of renewable energy in your electricity supply. But electricity aggregation does not replace National Grid as your electric utility.
Here’s how it works:
Without Beverly Community Electric
(Unless you already have a contract with an electricity supplier)
Typically, National Grid provides two services to you as an electricity customer, and your electricity bill includes charges for both of these services:
Electricity delivery |
National Grid’s primary role is as an electricity delivery company. They deliver electricity to you, maintain the poles and wires, and address power outages. They charge you for these services on the delivery services part of your National Grid electricity bill. |
Electricity supply |
National Grid can also provide a second service, which is to be your electricity supplier. They purchase electricity on your behalf and charge you on the supply services part of your National Grid electricity bill for the amount you use. When National Grid is your electricity supplier, you have National Grid’s Basic Service, and this is the default when you open your electricity account. |
The diagram below shows National Grid both delivering and supplying electricity.
National Grid’s fixed Basic Service prices change seasonally, every 6 months for residential and small business customers and every 3 months for large business customers, and future prices are not known.
With Beverly Community Electric
In an electricity aggregation like Beverly Community Electric, National Grid continues to deliver your electricity and you continue to call them when the power goes out, but you no longer have National Grid’s Basic Service for the supply portion of your electricity bill. Instead, the City of Beverly uses the bulk purchasing power of the community to negotiate a contract with an electricity supplier on behalf of residents and businesses and to determine the price of the community’s electricity supply and whether any additional renewable electricity is included.
If you participate in Beverly Community Electric, National Grid uses the Beverly Community Electric price to calculate the supply portion of your electricity bill instead of their own Basic Service price.
The diagram below illustrates how Beverly Community Electric will work. The only change is the electricity supplier on the left. Otherwise, the relationship between National Grid and electricity customers in Beverly does not change, and your electricity flows without interruption: