Former state Sen. David Sibley, vying in a special election for his old seat, defended Friday what is perhaps his biggest legislative accomplishment — a 1999 bill deregulating Texas’ retail electricity markets.

Sibley was one of the architects of the sweeping reforms that went into effect in 2002 and allowed home- owners and businesses in many parts of the state, including Waco, to choose their electric provider.

But several consumer groups, and recently Democratic gubernatorial candidate Bill White, have argued that home-owners have not seen the lower electric bills that were promised a decade ago.

Sibley disagrees.

“We said the hallmark of success would be consumers getting choice and competition driving down prices,” Sibley said. “I believe that’s happened on both fronts.”

David Sibley

But a recent study commissioned by Cities Aggregation Power Project, a coalition of Texas cities, comes to the opposite conclusion on price.

CAPP, which counts Bellmead, Robinson and Woodway as members, tracked the average price of electricity for residential customers in Texas against the national average during the 12 years leading up to the 2002 deregulation date and the ensuing seven years.

With the exception of a spike in late 2001 on the eve of deregulation, Texas’ electric rates were below the national average before the change and above the national average afterward.

It also notes that Texas’ rates had been competitive with Louisiana’s before deregulation. But since, Texas’ rates have increased at a faster pace than those in Louisiana, where the retail electric market is regulated.

Measures misleading?

Sibley said measuring deregulation using such comparisons is misleading.

“I really do think it’s dishonest when people say ‘Look at the averages,’ ” he said.

For starters, he said, before deregulation, environmentally friendly energy sources were off the table for Texans.

“And green energy is more expensive than coal,” he said.

Sibley said the new system also gives consumers the benefit of choice. Today a Waco homeowner can search the Internet and find a rate that’s lower than the average residential electric rates in all but a few states in the country, as well as numerous rates below the state’s average rate before deregulation kicked in.

“I think it’s critical that people shop,” Sibley said.

The more educated and active consumers are about their electric rates, the better the system works for them, Sibley said.

He said he gets frustrated by how many people he talks to about the system who don’t stay up-to-date on what they’re paying and what their options are.

“When I get into discussions with people about this, I’ll say, ‘Well, what are you paying per kilowatt-hour.’ And they don’t know,” he said.

Advocates critical of site

Consumer advocates have argued that the state’s Web site for picking an electric provider — www.powertochoose .com — can be daunting and confusing.

“There are better deals you can get if you shop around,” said Tom “Smitty” Smith, director of the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen.

“But they’re typically month-to-month, and most of us have better things to do with our lives than shop for electricity.”

Though Public Citizen has been critical of deregulation, Smith credited Sibley with giving a boost through the deregulation bill to green energy production in Texas.

“The reason we were so successful in development of renewable resources was because David Sibley chose to create a small, mandatory program that said everybody had to have a small percentage of their electricity coming from renewables,” Smith said.

“Once everybody got their fingers dirty with renewables, or began to understood their value, it took off.”

Texas is the largest producer of wind energy in the country.

Sibley said Texas could do better pricewise if the state starts producing a greater diversity of fuel types. As of 2006, almost half of Texas’ fuel mix came from natural gas. As a result the state is vulnerable to spikes in the price of natural gas.

“The one thing that concerns me is the vast majority of new power that’s been built since 1995 has been natural gas, so we are tied to a commodity,” Sibley said.

Mix of power sources

Sibley said the state needs a mix of nuclear, coal, natural gas and renewables, though he said the question of whether there should be more coal production specifically will be answered by private industry and not the legislature.

Coal is a touchy political subject in Central Texas. Just three years ago, state Rep. Charles “Doc” Anderson, R-Waco, spoke at a rally in Austin in favor of temporarily halting the construction of new coal-fired power plants because of the related health costs tied to pollution.

TXU — now called the Energy Future Holdings Corporation — was seeking a state permit at the time to build three coal plants in McLennan County.

Sibley noted that coal production has gotten cleaner recently but acknowledged the objections to coal.

“We need to walk a fine line in terms of what we want as far as clean coal technology,” Sibley said.

mshapiro@wacotrib.com

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