Beginning in January, Public Service Company of Oklahoma (PSO) will reduce the additional cost for about 1,000 customers who currently participate in its Green Energy Tariff, known as WindChoice – by as much as 76 percent – the utility announced on December 8.
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The electric utility company proposed the modifications to the tariff with a July 29 filing (Cause No. PUD 201600314) to the Oklahoma Corporation Commission. The commission approved PSO’s filing on December 6 (Order No. 658595).
PSO began offering WindChoice in 2011 to allow customers who wished to designate a specific amount of their energy requirement to come from wind. Under the newly-revised WindChoice tariff, not only will subscribers benefit from a much lower rate, they also will be able to choose the exact percentage of their electricity – from one to 100 percent – that comes from PSO’s Oklahoma-based renewable wind energy resource.
“WindChoice is an important option for customers — particularly those who are environmentally conscious or desire to support renewable energy in Oklahoma,” Scott Ritz, PSO director of customer services and marketing, said in a company statement. “Simplifying the tariff’s structure will allow customers to receive the renewable benefit from PSO’s wind resources at a much lower rate than before, which should make the program even more attractive to customers.”
Most of the customers who currently take advantage of the program are residential. PSO, a unit of American Electric Power, is an electric utility company serving more than 545,000 customers in eastern and southwestern Oklahoma.
