Lanesborough residents, businesses to see lower electricity rates

Lanesborough in January became the smallest of a handful of Massachusetts cities and towns that have enabled their residents and businesses to get better rates on electricity by soliciting bids on a collective contract for power generation.

Working with the Marlborough energy consulting firm Colonial Power Group, Lanesborough managed to obtain a bid for power generation that will lead to residents and businesses seeing a reduction of 5 percent to 8 percent in their electricity bills, according to Lanesborough Town Administrator Paul Boudreau.

Dominion Power will generate the power, while Western Massachusetts Electric will continue to distribute it, which accounts for roughly half the cost.

Lanesborough, with a population of about 3,100, had been working on the project for the past few years. A review process by the Department of Public Utilities took longer than expected, perhaps because Lanesborough was the first community in western Massachusetts to take this step, according to Boudreau.

Dominion Power’s bid led to an unexpected advantage: an electricity rate for commercial customers that was the same as the rate for residential customers.

“I could see this becoming a powerful economic development tool, if it’s done at the regional level,” Boudreau said.

Lanesborough was the first Berkshire County community to work with Colonial Power to pick an energy provider for residents and businesses. Ashland and Lunenburg also have recently established the same type of program, according to Brian Murphy, founder of Colonial Power Group. With Colonial Power’s assistance, Marlborough created a program in 2008.

Many local governments in Massachusetts already benefit from aggregate purchasing of electricity, thanks to the MMA’s MunEnergy program.