Energy Services

Managing Daily Power Supply, Market Transactions and Resource Planning

Energy Services coordinates the company’s participation in the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO) market in a number of ways.  First, we work with Power Production to offer the capabilities and output of our generating units and long-term power purchase agreements into the market in a way which maximizes our margins from these assets.  Second, we forecast the company’s next-day load requirements with the goal of minimizing the cost of that load.  Third, we utilize physical transactions and financial tools to hedge our exposure to market prices for capacity and energy and to congestion between our resources and our load.  Lastly, we represent the company within the MISO stakeholder process through committees, work groups and task forces to ensure that our interests are represented.

Energy Services is also responsible for identifying longer-term counterparties who might benefit from the company’s low-cost generation portfolio, to the extent that we have availability beyond that necessary to serve our Member-Owners.  We contact municipal utilities, cooperatives, and utilities across the Midwest in search of such potential customers. Transactions like these can provide value to Member-Owners and benefit employees, coal suppliers, other vendors, and the regional economy.

The Energy Services Department aggressively pursues opportunities to increase electric sales in this way, which will help lower electric rates for western Kentucky.

Other Energy Services responsibilities include:

  • Managing Demand Side Management (DSM), Energy Efficiency programs and other shared services for our Member-Owners
  • Preparing the company’s biannual long-term load forecast and triannual Integrated Resource Plan
  • Managing the company’s portion of hydroelectric power from the Cumberland River System from the Southeastern Power Administration

Economic Development

Big Rivers seeks to attract new corporate investment by working with local, state and national economic development organizations to facilitate expansion and economic growth in western Kentucky. We maintain an active presence in economic development by supporting strategic partners that promote economic investment and job growth in our region.  Along with our three distribution Member-Owners, we provide a variety of technical support services to help expanding and new companies grow their business.  In addition, we offer an extremely competitive economic development incentive rate for large and expanding industries, which provides a 90 percent reduction in kW billing demand.  If you are interested in learning more about our economic development incentive rate, please contact Brittaney Johnson, Director Economic Development, at brittaney.johnson@bigrivers.com.