Tompkins Green Energy Network
City and Town of Ithaca Public Statement
Having adopted some of New York’s leading municipal energy transition and climate action goals, the City of Ithaca and the Town of Ithaca are undertaking preparatory work to define and authorize staff to prepare a Community Choice Aggregation (CCA) plan for state approval.
The goal of the CCA program is to implement a broad and ambitious community-wide program to achieve a local energy transition by 2030 through electrification and building decarbonization. Once approved by the state, staff will proceed to solicit and evaluate bids, and then come back to the City and Town for their final approvals to launch service.
The proposed CCA program builds on the work of thousands of US municipalities serving millions of Americans, in New York, California, Ohio, Illinois, New Jersey. CCA is authorized in states comprising half the US energy market.
What is CCA & What does it do?
Community Choice Aggregation, or CCA, allows a municipality to choose where they source the energy that powers their homes, businesses, vehicles, and facilities. Essentially, CCA is a bulk purchase program that leverages collective buying power to secure better pricing on energy and allows a municipality to prioritize renewable energy sources, like solar or wind, for example. This creates a competitive market for utility providers, which, in turn, typically results in a lower price on residents’ electricity bills. CCA is a shift of utility control from supply to demand, which allows municipalities to exercise more local control over their energy resources. Importantly, CCA also still allows individual customers/residents the opportunity to opt-out of a bulk purchasing agreement without compromising access to energy distribution or transmission to either party, therefore still offering individual residents choice and flexibility.
What’s Next?
Ithaca has been working with nationally-acclaimed CCA expert Paul Fenn to set up a CCA program that provides a seamless transition to clean power and electrification. Further, the proposed model supports other clean energy projects aside from residential electrification including renewable microgrids, distributed energy resources, electric vehicles, and locally-owned renewable energy projects and battery backup.
The City and Town of Ithaca are finalizing their implementation plan for CCA, which will be followed by a proposed local law for the Town Board and Common Council to vote on, respectively. Once passed, the CCA agreement will be open for other local municipalities to join through an MOU.
Interested to find out how CCA can improve your municipality in Tompkins County? Talk to your elected representatives about CCA and why it’s important for a just transition from fossil fuels. You can find out more about the Ithaca CCA model in our resources section below.
Resources
- CCA Local Law Draft, Town of Ithaca – August 10, 2022
- Memo regarding CCA Local Law, Nick Goldsmith, Town of Ithaca – July 6, 2022
- Ithaca Community Choice Aggregation: An Update for Municipalities, City and Town of Ithaca webinar – April 21, 2022
- Community choice aggregation could bring clean energy, stable rates to Ithaca, Terry Carroll, Ithaca Times Op-Ed – February 25, 2021
- Community choice aggregation 3.0 national report: reducing greenhouse gas emissions, Local Power, Urban Sustainability Directors Network – March 6, 2020
- Community Choice Aggregation, NYSERDA Toolkit
Contact
Questions or comments? Please feel free to reach out to the City or Town at: