Electricity

WILLIAMSPORT - Out of $59,817 that the town has tried to collect from customers on overdue electricity bills, 74 percent was paid, according to a memo by Clerk/Treasurer James R. Castle. Accounts representing 8 percent of the overdue money were cut off, the memo says. Other customers received extensions, set up payment plans, had medical reasons for not having their power turned off, moved or were members of the military serving overseas, the memo says. Councilman James C. Kalbfleisch, who oversees the town's electricity department, said he believes leeway is needed.

A home health-care pharmacy truck hit a guy wire Monday afternoon, causing a "blip" in electricity service in Hagerstown, a city official said. The truck pulled a guy wire out of the ground at Wilson Boulevard and Frederick Street and bent a pole, Hagerstown Light Department Manager Karl Kohler said. The guy wire shook the power lines, causing a brief "blip, but not an outage, in the city's downtown and south and east ends, he said. Larger electricity users might have seen a brief gap in power if their buildings diverted to a backup source, he said.

daniels@herald-mail.com FREDERICK, MD. - Pittsburgh-based Alcoa intends to follow through with projected layoffs and cutbacks at its Eastalco aluminum smelter in Frederick starting Dec. 19 because it was unable to secure a more competitive, long-term electricity contract within Maryland's deregulated electricity market, the company said in a statement Wednesday. The company, which employs more than 600 workers at the plant according to company information, expects to retain about 100 workers while it gears down and will maintain a skeleton crew of about 25 workers after the transition.

WILLIAMSPORT - Town resident James T. Jewell presented the mayor and Town Council with a request to form an electricity cost review committee. The written request says the committee's purpose would be to "let the people make an informed decision ... to continue with the present system by which the town buys and resells the power, or to consider an outside source. " The town's electricity customers can nominate themselves for the committee. Twelve names would be chosen at random to serve, followed by six alternates.

Allegheny Power customers in Maryland may see a slight decrease in their bills next month, under a rate reduction request before the Public Service Commission. The company has asked the PSC to decrease its fuel rate from 1.195 cents per kilowatt hour to 1.118 cents per kilowatt hour. If approved, the average customer using 1,000 kilowatts of electricity would see a 75-cent reduction in their monthly bill effective Dec. 7. The fuel rate is a small line item on Maryland customers' bills that reflects the cost of fuel used to generate electricity.

Hagerstown Light Department charges have dropped to a 15-year low, which means average customers will pay about $60 less in 1999 than they did last year, department Manager Terry Weaver said Monday. The lower charge is the result of a new electricity purchasing contract with Allegheny Power, which the City Council approved in June. [cont. from front page ] Overall, bills for the approximately 17,000 Light Department customers will be almost 12 percent lower this year.

Allegheny subsidiary to sell power to California By ANDREW SCHOTZ andrews@herald-mail.com A division of Allegheny Energy Inc. has signed a 10-year, $4.5 billion contract to supply electricity to the state of California. continued Allegheny Energy Supply Company, LLC, will provide up to 1,000 megawatts of electricity - enough to supply about 1 million homes - from four gas-fired plants in southern California, according to Michael P. Morrell, the president of Allegheny Energy Supply Co., the company's electric generation division.

About 450 Hagerstown customers lost their electricity and a city employee was taken to the hospital Thursday afternoon after a wire came loose and sparked, a city official said. About 1 p.m., at Wilson Boulevard and Oak Street, a de-energized signal wire came loose as an employee in the city's public works signal department was working, said Mike Spiker, Hagerstown's director of utilities. The employee didn't touch the wire, but there was "a ball of fire," so the employee was checked out at the hospital as a precaution, Spiker said.

HAGERSTOWN The price of heating oil being used in Washington County's public schools has spiked this winter, and officials say they will monitor and manage the purchase of fuel oil to minimize the impact. Dale Diller, energy management analyst for Washington County Public Schools, says the school system recently received its first delivery of heating oil that will be used this winter. That load was 43 percent more expensive than last year's average cost, he said. Last year's price was $1.63 per gallon, he said.

Power has been restored to nearly all the nearly 2,700 Allegheny Power customers in the Hagerstown and Maugansville areas who were without electricity early this morning, according to the company's Web site. As of 7 a.m., only 3 customers in the county were without power, the Web site reported. The outages appeared to be weather-related, a company spokesman said.