ANN ARBOR, Mich. (WXYZ) — Just days after storms caused another round of power outages in metro Detroit, the Michigan Public Services Commission announced a new straw proposal that would tie utility company profits more directly to their performance.
The commission says they’re concerned about the amount of repeated outages and also the length of outages. They are now asking customers for their input on how this profit and performance plan might work.
Off a two-lane road in Dexter, Chris Justice is well attuned to where his power lines are. It may be a relatively quiet area, but he and his neighbors are used to frequent visits from DTE linemen.
“It’d just be great if they didn't have to show up so often, you know? I've had too many conversations with them,” Justice said. “They’re nice guys, but I don’t want to know them.”
In just the last 12 months, Justice says he’s had 33 power outages. He provided 7 Action News an email from DTE customer service to prove it, showing he had 18 momentary outages and 15 sustained outages. Sustained outages are categorized as outages lasting five minutes or more.
“I’ll be sitting in the house and the lights will kind of be boop, boop, boop, boop, on and off. And then boop, the power will go off,” Justice said. “It's frustrating when it goes off when the weather is nice or it's raining lightly… why do we continually have that going on?”
The Michigan Public Services Commission says he and his neighbors aren’t alone. Just last year, between both Consumers Energy and DTE, more than 330,000 customers had four or more sustained outages. Some had more than seven.
“We've got 35,000 people across the state of Michigan who essentially every six weeks are having an outage that’s lasting five minutes or more,” MPSC Chair Dan Scripps said. “That's clearly unacceptable.”
On Wednesday, the commission announced a straw proposal to tie utility company earnings directly to performance, based on the amount and length of outages.
“We’re not where we need to be,” Scripps said. “When we’re sort of bottom of the league tables in both duration of outages and the number of customers experiencing outages over and over again in the course of a year, there’s clearly a ton of room for improvement.”
In a statement, a DTE spokesperson said:
“We are reviewing the MPSC's straw proposal and will offer feedback at the request of the commission on performance-based disincentives and incentives. Our work to reduce the frequency and duration of outages is already underway. We are executing our four-point plan to transform the electric grid to build the grid of the future for Michigan that our customers expect and deserve. From trimming thousands of miles of trees, updating existing infrastructure, rebuilding significant portions of the grid and accelerating our transition to a smart grid, we are laser focused on delivering for our customers.”
But thus far, Justice hasn’t been satisfied with the answers he’s received from DTE, hoping for a long-term fix that doesn’t leave his rural neighbors behind.
“All we hear is like, ‘We’re trimming tree limbs,’ and that’s sort of the end of the discussion,” Justice said. “It's frustrating because it's 2023. All things being equal, we should be able to get electricity.”
In their news release, MPSC said,
“Today’s order seeks comments from stakeholders on the preliminary straw proposal by 5 p.m. Sept. 22, with reply comments due by 5 p.m. Oct. 20. Comments should reference Case No. U-21400. Comments may be mailed to Executive Secretary, Michigan Public Service Commission, P.O. Box 30221, Lansing, MI 48909, or emailed to mpscedockets@michigan.gov. Comments also may be filed through the Commission’s E-Dockets system at Case No. U-21400; instructions are available on the E-Dockets website.”
