Greene County Presiding Commissioner Dave Coonrod and Springfield Mayor Tom Carlson have appointed 17 people to serve on the Power Supply Community Task Force to study issues regarding the Springfield area’s energy needs. The task force will study power supply issues and recommend solutions according to a city of Springfield news release. Recommendations of the task force will be forwarded to the Board of Public Utilities for consideration. Carol Williamson and Jack Stack have agreed to co-chair the task force, which holds its first meeting at 8:30 a.m. March 7 at SRC New Stream, 3055 E. Division St. “We hope that having an independent task force review all of these issues will give the community confidence that the absolute best solutions will be recommended to assure that we continue to have a cost-effective and reliable power supply,” Coonrod said in the release. The task force will consider the community’s future power supply, increased demands for power related to growth and new technologies, industry trends in generation and transmission, and the willingness of customers to use conservation and renewable resources. Board member Rita Needham, executive director of Southwest Area Manufacturers Association, said it took some work to convince CU to allow her to join the group, but she’s glad she was chosen. “For the last two years we have been very interested in how CU is going to (meet) long-term power needs and do that at an affordable price,” she said. “Our manufacturers are large users of power. It’s a costly item, and it’s an area that can determine whether they can maintain competitiveness. So it is a very crucial factor for us and for the thousands of jobs those manufacturers provide in this area.” Needham said she was not originally chosen for the task force, but she was added after she sent a letter to the mayor requesting to be chosen. In related news, the Board of Public Utilities has received responses to a request for information on power supply for Springfield from 19 power generators and brokers around the area. The responses, which represent 44 percent of the 43 packets sent out, are under review. They address how respondents would supply 275 megawatts of electricity to CU.
