 We are now recording. So welcome folks to our Valley Green Energy meeting. We're here with Paul Groomer this morning to talk about our responses to the request for information from the Department of Public Utilities. And with that, Paul, I will hand it over to you. Wonderful. Thank you very much. It's good to see everyone. So what I wanted to do today was to explain the request we've received from the Department of Public Utilities, put those in context a little bit, talk about our responses, and then drill into a little bit more detail about an issue that's relevant to one of the responses. So as is customary, the Valley Green Energy has received a set of questions from the Department of Public Utilities. They call them information requests. I can say that these requests are very light. There are only three questions. Recently, municipal aggregations have been receiving 20, 30 questions. So it's a light set of questions. The essence of them is to update your plan to meet the DPU's most current requirements. So their requirements have been changing. They've been revolving, I should say. They've issued new orders since your plan was written. And they just, before approving it, they want you to catch up with the current state of things. That's very common. And it's very common. I'll also say that getting these information requests is a positive sign in that it shows the DPU is looking at the plan, actively reviewing it. So that's all very positive. The other thing, just bigger picture, big picture, which will be a little relevant to the discussion is that the regulation of aggregation plans has been evolving and was going in one way and is about to go in a different way. So over the last several years, they've been increasingly restrictive of what programs could do and much more into the details of specifying you have to do this, you have to do this, you can't do that other thing. And that's still the current state, you know, those are still the current requirements. And that attitude of things is in your questions because you have to comply with the current rules. I'll also say, though, the DPU with the new commissioners in place with the new administration, they're very actively looking at providing more flexibility to cities and towns in the operation of these programs. I have a very high degree of confidence that when they've worked through that process, though there will be more flexibility. And the DPU has said anybody who has a plan that's already approved will be able to take advantage of the new flexibility. So we're going to need to tighten some things up, just a few things to comply with the current rules, which are based on this direction. Soon we can think there's going to be a shift and a broadening of authority and we'll be able to take advantage of that once it's in place. It's just not there yet, but it will be in place with us. So that's the overview. The three areas that the Department of Public Utilities has asked for changes are, or maybe they can be put into three areas. One is just to state in the plan some of their requirements. So in the past, they didn't require that you like say you were going to do X and Y because X and Y was required. So of course you were going to do it. But in the more recent regulation, there's just been a more of a push on being explicit about some of the requirements in the plan. So the majority of the changes we'll make are just to do that, just to state rules. You were going to comply with otherwise anyway, but you hadn't been before, but necessary to write them down. Then, and this will be the most important, I think, discussion for today, there's a requirement for more detail about decision making about the percentage and types of recs that you purchase. So we've said in your plan, and this is typical, you don't want to make the decision now about how many additional recs you're going to have, for example, because you haven't seen the price yet. So you can't make that decision in advance. And the DPU gets that and they're supportive of that. It makes perfect sense. But their new requirement is, well, if we're going to give you that flexibility, we want you just to be more explicit about who's going to make this decision and what criteria are you going to use? So I've proposed some edits to the plan, which we can look at in a minute, which we'll discuss that. So here's who's going to decide and here's who are what are the decision making criteria. The other area where they're more restrictive is in uses of the operational adder. We put in our plan, that's the extra fee that Valla Green Energy could collect through the energy price. We had put in there a whole bunch of things you could use it for. The DPU has, and we knew when we wrote it, it was asking for more flexibility than they had been giving recently. They knocked us back to what they'd been approving recently. I do think this is going to be one of those areas that's going to loosen up or where more authority will be, more discretion will be given to municipalities, we'll be able to take advantage of that when it happens. But for the purpose of getting the plan approved now, we just need to scale it back. So those are the three areas. So why don't I bring up the plan and we can look at those, the two things that matter, not the like, you have to say this rule, that's just something you have to do and it doesn't matter. But the two things that do matter are the decision making around the REX and then secondly, the operational adder. We'll just look at those two things. And actually, forgive the long intro, but let's look at the operational adder first. And that's because it's simpler, number one. And number two, on the decision making, we're going to go through what I've proposed for the plan. But then Stephanie suggested, well, in to make this decision, it might be helpful to understand more about how this decision is actually going to be made, to make the decision about how you're going to make this decision. Let's learn more about what the decision is and how it works. So I'll give you a preview of how that decision making will happen once you're at the stage where you're taking bits. So that's a long intro. I think it'll be maybe clearer when I start to show things. So the first thing I'm going to do is bring up the aggregation plan. I'm set to find it here. All right. So I'm just going to scroll to the adder section. You see the document with the scrolling going on now? Yes. Okay. So is that big enough to see? Is it helpful if I make it bigger? It's okay with me, but it wouldn't hurt to make it bigger. Bigger would be helpful. All right. Let me see if I can zoom that up. Is that better? Great. Perfect. All right. So this is the section of the plan regarding the operational adder, and this is a red line version. So it's what we proposed, what the DPUs asked us to add. The key thing is that we had proposed multiple purposes, personnel costs, rec purchases, enhanced customer education, and then other things, support for local projects that might help those projects help the program. The things the DPU has asked us to take out is everything other than personnel costs and rec purchases. So anything like to help local projects is out for now. Again, I fully expect that that authority is going to come back, but we just have to take it out for the time being. Then in addition, they want to say, well, who's going to decide whether to collect the adder and how much? And so I proposed in here that it's the partners group that would decide, and I think it sort of has to be that since that's the memorandum of understanding under which you're operating as a group. And then what's the criteria? I suggested what seemed like logical ones to me, which is the cost of electricity and the incremental value you could collect with this adder. Oh, are you asking for us to comment on this? Well, I suppose that yes, so exactly right. So you would need to be comfortable with this language. So does this, I'll ask the question, does this make sense to you as an approach? Well, I have one quick question, not directly to the language, but when do we anticipate those regulatory changes that would allow for more flexibility might happen? I mean, I know you can't say exactly, but roughly in your experience. I guess within the next six months. Oh, okay. All right. So this, I mean, by the time we get approved, this could actually change. We could have more flexibility soon after launch. Yes. Yes. Exactly right. That's what I'm thinking. Okay. Would the plan have to be amended again once in order to exercise that flexibility? Yes. So that's, that's a really good question. And the answer to that is not entirely clear. The DPU has said they don't want to be looking at 150, there are 150 plans out there now, if they open up the rules, they don't want 150 plan amendments. So there's going to be some simplified process to take advantage of the new opportunities. I don't know what that is yet that's one of the things folks are wrestling with because it probably can't just be the towns can just go do it. But it also can't be they have to file a revised plan for approval because, you know, the DPU couldn't handle the workload. So just wondering if, you know, the possibility of if we could have language or communities had language that said something like, you know, in adherence to current regulations, and revised plans will be submitted upon regulatory change or something to that effect, but something that says that that we could just submit a plan with the changes to reflect the change to regulations, but not that it needs approval. I'm putting that out there as a potential pathway, not for our group, but just wondering in general, knowing that you go back and weigh in. I'm just wondering if that's something that could be done. Yes, well, that's exactly what I suggested to them, that that's how they should do it, that the plan should, the town should decide how they want to change their plan. They should have a public hearing about it the way you had, make the change and then just submit it so the DPU has it, but no approvals required. That's exactly the process I suggested. They haven't decided yet what they're going to go with, but I think it's going to be something along those, would have to be something along those lines, I think. Okay, technical question. Go ahead, go ahead, Andrew. What is ESA? I'm sorry, what is what? ESA. Oh, that's the, that's the, that's the contract with the electricity supplier. So the, the adder, electricity supply agreement in the rates, and so it's got to be reflected in that agreement. And it seemed logical. You, in practice, this is the way it works. Each time you enter into a supply agreement, you're picking a price and you're deciding then, okay, we want to include that adder, the adder in that price or not. That's the time to do it. Thank you. Paul, do you have any, at your fingertips, how many kilowatt hours are the three communities going to use? In other words, how much money does a tenth of a penny correspond to? Good question. I can't remember for certain, but I think it's in the ballpark of 75,000 a year, but I'm not. But I, it's not 10 and it's not 200. So that's, that's, that's good. And the, the other key thing, just while we're talking about the adder is that, and this was true always, it has to be used for program related expenses. So you can't use it, you know, you couldn't use it for, you wouldn't, but like fire trucks or something, it has to be for the program. And other changes, I'll just scroll through it because you'll see that in the plan, but these aren't, these aren't things that we can have any choice about and they're just stating the law. You know, you're going to set, the way you're going to set the hours, you're going to figure out what your program expenses are, and then you're going to set the adder, commensurate with that. And what you do, you're not going to be duplicating what the consultant is doing. So you're going to be doing additional stuff. That's all, obviously, would have to be that way. We just need that. But this is just, this is just the rule. You're going to charge an amount that fits what you're going to do, what you're going to do has to be for the program. And you're not going to be double paying for things that we're already supposed to do for you. Sure. It may make sense if this, because of the structure around the rec decision is similar, it may make sense to flip to that and sort of talk, we could continue to talk through the same set of decision making criteria when looking at, when looking at that. They're similar. And I want to be sure we have enough time for the rec discussion. Carol has a question. Yes, Carol. Hi. Sorry. Quick one, though, related to the program fees that are allowable now, there's now a bunch of other communities that are doing this. So there's examples of, because I know we struggled with this in the past, like how to do it that doesn't overlap with something existing, you're nodding. So I'll just take that as a yes. Thank you. That's just right. So the most communities that have the ad are now use it for staff. And it's just kind of like, I mean, it's sort of like this. You have the staff do things that wouldn't be happening otherwise. So you wouldn't have them do things that were happening otherwise. And so we work it out. And usually it's a way to enhance the program, you know, provide more service to customers because now there are more people working on it. So it's partly that. And it's also partly just covering the costs of the time that municipal staff is spending on this program anyway. So, you know, it's covering that cost, which is otherwise covered out of other town revenue. Yeah. So it's not coming from our capital or operating. It's coming from the adder. Correct. So could we, so I'm thinking like Peregrine mass power is, you know, doing the high level stuff, getting everything up to run. And then like if there's, you know, local outreach, for example, that that kind of activity to make the community aware of the program and what it can do, that that would be how we spend that money. Yes. Or that's a good example. And so, and that's an area where there's some amount of that that we do, but it has a limit, you know, be, you know, we only make some money. For sure. We have other things we have to do. I mean, so of course, right. So there's always more you could do. And the, the towns that take this out or they do more, they're, and they're in the community every day. So they can, you know, do more stuff, more events, more communication, you know, conversations with customers, more stuff, more, you know, more of the, just more of what you, what you want the program to do. And could these funds, like, do we have to look at these funds as going to a dedicated person who would be hired just for this? Or could they be allocated to an existing position? Okay. Could be existing for sure. I think that was just saying is that it wouldn't have to come out of, you know, if so, for instance, Carol and I are both paid by our community right now. Right. But me especially, I've spent a lot of time working on this. And that's being paid for by the town's funds. So in case now we could separate that out. And I'm wondering, like, Tom's been doing this work for Pelham. Would that enable Tom to get compensated for the time that he would? I would go to some, I don't need to be compensated, but I appreciate the suggestion. I'm just saying if someone were to, you know, for a Pelham, because Pelham doesn't have a large staff, could Pelham use some of the admin fee to actually bring someone on even just to work on this piece part time? Sure. I mean, however the numbers worked out, you know, or that it would work just mechanically might work better with an existing person. Well, actually sort of thinking it through. I mean, it's a handful of hours. Maybe you could hire someone on an hourly basis, a contract basis for this specific thing. It's a, you know, it's not a full-time job. It's a limited number of hours and you could pay for those hours for sure. And Bob, that'll ultimately be your call. But I'm thinking, and thank you, Stephanie, for thinking of me, but I'm thinking like, you know, the people in Town Hall that are, you know, you know, certainly that the burden has not been great at this point, but we've had Susanna posting them minutes and, you know, things like that, and if we were to do an event at the library, for example, there will be staff time associated with that. So I'm thinking that once we get to the point of approval, we decide as three communities how that money might be allocated. And then your call, Bob, on how we would actually, you know, put people to work, that I think that it would be somebody already on staff, but I don't, I don't know that for sure. Thanks, Tom. It is something to think about. And I appreciate Stephanie bringing this up, bringing this up as well, in terms of our community where it's a whole lot different and the incredible investment of time, your time, Tom, and also, you know, the folks from the Amherst and Northampton Town Halls. I mean, my God, you're doing a lot of heavy work here, and it's very much appreciated. And so I'd want to make sure that whatever we do gets reflects, reflects that in terms of how we spend those funds. Excellent. Let me flip if it's okay. I'm just going to scroll back and we're going to look at that rec decision. And sorry for the scrolling. Yeah, so this is the key one. So they asked you to do it. And what we have here is the description of Valley Green Energy Standard Green. So they asked us to say, they asked you, one is to, just a space here, they asked us to say a little more definition like we use said additional recs will like give us a range or something they've asked for. So this is the middle product, right? It's more than the bottom one and it's less than the top one. So more than this, but less than that. And then this would be the key paragraph is the bigger one in red there, which says the percentage and types of recs you're going to be decided by the partners group after you get competitive bids. And in considering factors, including cost, environmental impact, where the generators come from and Massachusetts renewable energy requirements. There's no magic to that list. If there's some other list that's more comfortable. These are just some of the factors you might want to think about. And then the other key things they want you to say, but this is stuff you would do anyway, you can change it after you establish them. If you do change, you just tell people and then you're going to say what the types of recs are in the program materials. That's you're going to do that anyway, you know, the opt out letter, the website and other things. So the second half of that paragraph is really just stating what the rules would be and what you would do. The first is about who's deciding and what the criteria are. And that you might want to spend a few just be sure you're comfortable with that language or we can change it. There isn't magic to this. We just need to say something. That language seems solid to me. Can't think of anything left out or that I would recommend adding. Yeah, I'm comfortable with this language because I think as long as we can include environmental impact, that was kind of our driver right from the gate. So I think as long as that's in there, that's important. A question about the location of the renewable generators. Is that specifically pertaining to the renewable generators of the wrecks? Yes, exactly right. So what I was thinking there and we discussed, right, you recognize the premium value of generation in New England as compared to generation in some other place. So I thought you suggested that as one of the criteria to consider. Thanks. Yeah, I can't think of anything that I would suggest here. Well, it's good to me. Harold, you want to weigh into? I don't know if I should, but I would just, I don't know if it's helpful. But one of the things that I found useful is as we know, Class 1 wrecks are the most expensive. And I know there's a belief that that encourages further renewable development. And that's the driver behind aiming for that. Also just being local is great to New England. And I don't know if it's helpful, but there's also this EPA Green Power Partnership that has their criteria of what qualifies for green electricity. And those are newer than I think it's 10 years old. There's definitely some requirements. And it's not the same as Class 1, but as a, I don't know if that could be a second tier of evaluation in addition to price that we could target EPA Green Power certified wrecks that, or it's not certified, it's a designation. But as a way to kind of prioritize that we are having, because I'm not really sure how else you value the environmental impact. So it's just another kind of stage. And I'll leave that there, not trying to open a bag of worms or anything, but just it's something that I use that helped me to kind of have a framework to explain to the community of why we did it, the way we did it. Can that be in there, Paul? Well, yes. And what I would suggest as a way to capture this, the point that Carol raised, which I think is an important one, not just including the EPA standards, but just in general, would be the age of the generator. So it's important, I think, to look not only at where I hadn't thought of this, but now the Carol's comments made me think you want to look just not only at where they are, but when they were built. So like Class 1 has the requirement, it has to have been built after a certain date. EPA has a different, you know, more recent date, but you'd want to consider that as well. So we could put without referring to a specific, you know, standard, we could say the location and age, operation date, or age, operation, either, whatever, operation date sounds more I'll keep that in there. Because that's a really important factor, right? That's, you know, in just like location, that's a super important one. So I think it's an enhancement to put that in there. Well, in the way this paragraph is worded, it talks and in consideration of factors including which doesn't necessarily mean it's an exhaustive list. It just means that, you know, these are the things that we'll look at, but there could be others. At least that's how I would interpret it. Maybe I'm wrong. But that was just the intent, Bob, to some of the things you would look at, but leave you the flexibility to consider other things. Other things, right. So to Carol's point, that could just be the other things we consider and we don't necessarily have to have that reflected in this paragraph. But it gives us the opportunity to be able to do that. Yes, that's what I was thinking, you know, because this language, it sort of gets to the class one rules, but doesn't say it has to be class one. It gets to the EPA rules, but doesn't say it has to be that exactly, but gets to the, like sort of the factors or the criteria that are behind those rules. So if you're coming, I mean, I'll say, you know, other communities have used language very much like this. They're thinking about it, you know, just the same way. I'll ask, are you guys comfortable with this language here? I am. All right. So if you guys are good, we'll go with this. I wanted to get to the to looking at the pricing decision in more detail. That will be an interesting conversation that just maybe before we move that just to flag the process from here. So we've discussed now what are the, I would say are the substantive changes that the DP or the most important ones the DPU has asked for. There are also like a bunch of little things, as I said, that are more about stating what the rules are rather than changing anything in your plan. As a process, we need to file the answers to the information requests and include with that a red line version of this red line version of the of the other documents as well. By next Friday is the group comfortable, you know, if, if, and I'm sorry, Stephanie, I don't mean to volunteer you, but it's a group of Stephanie and I just work out the details of it from here. Or how would you like to proceed from as a process matter? I'm perfectly comfortable with that arrangement. Stephanie doesn't look comfortable. I'm fine. I'm just looking to other people to, you know, I would, you know, like people to just wait. And so Adele, Carol, Tom. I'm not sure if I'm following, but in the past, because Peregrine's the best, they would make their edits based on our discussions. And then we just review it and then collectively, if there were any comments. So I guess, I guess maybe that's what it is, is you would be the collector of the comments, Stephanie. Or, okay. Or I think Paul is saying that I just, that it doesn't necessarily because of time, necessarily go back to the whole group. But I think given, right, he would just make whatever edits and I would just review them on behalf of the group. Yep. Following this conversation is all. And it's fair enough though. So it's, we have another week. I can go through, make sure I have everything done and send them to you on Monday with the red one. So red line version of this, red line version of the outreach plan. The letters got changed a little bit to explain what the changes are there. Why don't I just send everything to you, Stephanie, on Monday, and then you can circulate it to the others. It's a chance to look at it. We do have until Friday. So, and then I would want everyone's comments by Wednesday. If you have comments or concerns, I would want them by Wednesday. Excellent. And that's okay with you, Stephanie. That's not okay. Totally. That sounds like a good process. Yeah, thank you. So if you guys have a few more minutes, we can go through what the decision will look like when you're deciding about the amount of wrecks, like how that would work, just to give a little more color to what we've put here. So I'm just going to stop sharing this and share something different. Can you guys see a PowerPoint there? Yes. So to back up a little bit on the pricing, on the decision process. So you decide about the percentage of additional wrecks and the types of wrecks. As we were saying, like when you get the bids from the electricity supplier, so you're making that decision when you know how much it costs. So you can say, okay, we're going to add exaprano wrecks because it costs Y and we've decided Y is within what we think is a good, you know, reasonable price we want to charge for this. You want to make all those decisions together. The tricky aspect of it, and some of you have been through this before I know, is that electricity price bids when they come in are only good for a couple of hours. And that's because the electricity markets are very volatile. So the suppliers won't hold the bid for a few hours. So the day the bid comes in, there's not a lot of time for, you know, thinking about, well, it's time to think, but there isn't a lot of time for, a lot of time for conversation or process. You have to be ready to decide on that day. So you need to do the process ahead of time to be ready. The way we try to help facilitate that is before we get the actual bid you need to decide on a few weeks before that, we get what are called indicative bids, which are non binding, but they'll just give you a sense of what you're going to see. Those bids you can take your time with, you're not making a decision on them, but you can look and you can see, okay, well, this costs this, that's going to cost that, and you can kind of narrow down your decision criteria. So you're ready to make a final decision quickly on the bid day. So we give you those indicative bids first and we go through them with you in a, in the same format, you're going to see the actual bids on bid day. So you're not only familiar with the numbers, you're familiar with the formatting, try to make everything as clear as possible. So what I did today to walk you through that was to do up like an illustrative version of the indicative bid. So this is completely phony, but it's the same form of presentation, the same decision. So that's, that's what I'm going to walk through now, if that makes sense for folks. So, so what would happen is we would, we would get the bids in, we schedule a meeting for you and we go through a PowerPoint that looks like this, the first thing, just a little thing, but you want to keep these bids confidential, because you don't want the different suppliers to learn what each other is bidding. So it's in, it's in your interests, not to keep this as a private conversation. And that's allowed by state law, specifically exempt from public disclosure. So these are the things we would, you know, the goal, this is the indicative presentation. So the goal is to get ready for the actual bid day to learn if you need more information. So we can gather that for you in advance. And we look at a few different things, market prices, a few other things. So I'll just, I'll take through them and I'll go through it a little faster, maybe then we would on the real thing. So the first thing we often look at is what's going on with electricity in the electricity market. So this, this graph is probably looks a little more confusing than it is. So what it shows is the cost to buy electricity at any point in time for delivery in the future. And that's because that's the decision you're making. You're deciding today for electricity to be delivered to you, supplied to you next year and the year after that. And the way the markets work, they're forward prices. So I know I can make a commitment to buy electricity today for delivery in a year at a specific price. And the different colors here show the different years of delivery, but more important than the colors is just the shape. And what we see is that electricity prices, this is in New England and these are just wholesale costs are not the full cost. It was really stable for about eight years. And then once we got into COVID prices started going up with the war in Ukraine prices really skyrocketed. They've come back down now and kind of stabilized a couple of pennies higher than they used to be, but much better than they were at the peak. What's relevant for you about this graph is two things. One is, does it seem like a good time to be buying electricity or does it seem like a crazy time in the market? You know, up at that peak was a crazy time, but we're not at that now. And then second looking at this, do you want to make a long term price commitment or a short term price commitment? Back when prices were really stable all the time, a long term seemed like a good deal and turned out to be a great deal for the communities that did it. When prices were way up at their peak, wasn't a good time to make a long term commitment because they could come falling back down at any time. And so at that point in time, when right at the peak, most communities went with a shorter term price. And that worked out well for them too. So they had that high price for a year or so, but then we're able to get a better contract after the prices dropped. So this is just information that helps inform the kind of decision you're going to make. The next thing we'll do, you guys don't need this so much, but just a reminder of what are the options in the program and what decisions are you making and this is really focused on the standard product. It's going to have some additional renewable electricity, the percentages to be decided, and that's one of the things you're deciding. As part of this. And then these are the decisions you're going to make, whether to accept a bid, because you can always say, no, we don't like any of these, we want to try and get another day. But if you select a bid, you're going to decide on a term, you're going to pick a supplier, and then you're going to choose the percentage of voluntary renewables. So that was all the wind up. So once you see the prices, they're going to come in and it's going to look like this. You're going to see a table, and it's going to have different suppliers, a column for different suppliers. And when the bids are real, you'll see the names of the suppliers. This is just generic for today. And then different terms, so 12 month term, 24 month term, 36 month term. And then you'll see you get different prices from the different suppliers for the different terms. And what we'll do on the day of it is one will talk through the different suppliers who are the best to work with, who are, and if any of them as an outlier, you might feel, you might have second thoughts about picking or whether they're all good solid companies. And by and large, we'd only bring in bids from good solid companies, but we'll talk through that. And then we'll talk through the different terms, and you'll decide based in part on how long a commitment makes sense, given where the market is, and also how the prices differ by term. So sometimes some terms are way the price is noticeably lower than the others. I don't think that's so much the case of these, this example, but if 24 months was a lot lower than 12 or 36, you might head towards 24 because that seemed to be the most attractive price. And then we'll also have the key comparison is how do these prices compared to basic service. And so we'll have the basic service prices down here. So you can make that, you can make that comparison and we'll have the price for the current basic service term. And then we'll give you an estimate of what it's going to be for the next basic service term. Basic service terms only set six months, prices only set six months at a time. So we can't say for certain what the next one's going to be, but we'll give you our best estimate and maybe give you a range on what that's going to look like. At program launch, the most important comparison is to the current basic service price, but you'll also want to be, know as much as you can about how those prices are trending and what the next one is likely to be. And then, and we can go back to this if it's important, but I want to like complete the picture, you choose this price, this is the price for base electricity, which all the required renewables, everything that's required, but nothing else. And then you're going to decide the additional renewables on top of that. And so the way that works is we create this other slide, which begins by taking one of the prices from the slide before for the base electricity, and then we show the cost of additional racks at different percentages. So just for illustration here, I used 5%, 10%, 15%, 20%, we can use whatever percentages you want. And then to see what the total price would be, you sum those two numbers. So in this 20% column, for example, you've got 14.6 cents base price to get 20% extra wrecks costs eight tenths of a cent per kilowatt hour. And so the total would be 15.4. And then you could compare that to the basic service prices down in the bottom left and decide, you know, does that seem like a good price? Or do you want it, you know, as a room for more extra renewables, or you want to keep the price a little bit lower? So maybe you go to a lower percentage. That was a lot of talking from me. So I'll pause there and ask if there are questions or things we should drill in on either on this slide or the slide before. Well, this, the point where we go over, well, this is the indicative pricing. So this is kind of the initial conversation that we have. Correct. And when it comes time for, and you're going to get to that in a minute, I think. Well, it's going to look just like this, except that they're going to be actual bids and you're going to have to decide. So the presentation looks the same either way. Yep. First, you'd see it in an indicative where there's plenty of time to talk about it. And then you'd see it on an executable price day where you'd have to decide within an hour or two. So I think the key here, which I wanted to point out, because it came up in our conversation, is when it's time to actually make that decision, who is making that actual decision? Because I think you refer to mayors, executives are typically the ones that make that decision, correct? Correct. For an individual community, yes, exactly right. So we did this with the city of Beverly last week, or maybe earlier this week. It was the mayor. So the people in the room were the mayor, his sustainability staff and other key staff who he views as his important advisors. He decided it because he signs, both because he's the chief executive of the city and he signs the contract with the supplier. So he's making this pick. For you, I'm very glad you raised this Stephanie, because this is actually the reason to bring this up today. Who's going to make this decision for Valley Green? It's going to be, I think, well, I'll suggest, but you guys decided it would have to be the partner's group. So one representative from each municipality. And then I think you would decide who would be the person from the municipalities? Would it be the chief executive from the municipality? So the mayor and the town manager and you, Bob, or you could delegate it to somebody else. That would be up to you. Well, I think that's, I mean, I think it's up to our executive. Like in my case, it's not up to me or this group. It's up to the town manager who he wants to delegate to make that decision. Because it may be him, but like I know our former finance director was more than capable. And actually the finance director before him as well. So I think he may do it himself or he may want them to do it. So again, it's who he designates. But I think he would certainly want the representative of this group to be present, which would be me, at least for now anyway. And I don't know how I would assume Northampton would be maybe similar. I don't know. And Bob, I guess you all, you, Tom, would decide who propell them. Yes. Yeah. And Bob, you know, I'm an advisor to the energy committee, but John Larson, I think is still the chair, right? And John's with the rhodium group, Paul, and I think has a wealth of knowledge about electricity markets. So I mean, to the extent that we can, you know, get the process information earlier, I'd love to get that in front of him and the rest of the energy committee for their input. Well, yeah, go ahead. Sorry, I was just going to say to the point that when we were talking about when we received this indicative pricing, we talked about Paul and I talked about how we could do this in a way that, you know, it could basically be shared publicly, at least this initial conversation. The final decision making is obviously not going to be public, but at least Paul said there's a way in which you can sort of do a range or some way that it's not specific that would allow us to do this in this meeting. So with this group, we could just make sure that we have those folks, you know, like John at this meeting. What do we do if the decision maker is not available on the day that it has to be done? Okay. Yeah, I mean, so we would, they have to be, so we schedule it in a bit. And we have to choose that you have to be able to decide in your however you want to decide, since you're a group, you know, by whatever process you get to pick the process, but you have to be able to decide and some, some person has to sign a contract that day. If you're not able to, then the bids would no longer be valid. So I guess let's see if the worst happened, you know, the whatever reason the person is supposed to decide can't be there, be part of it. We would just have to cancel it or we would see the bids, but we couldn't commit to any of them and we'd have to do it again another day. I think in our process, so Paul, you said one, one community because we're an entity, one community and Amherst currently being the lead would sign, but the decision would be made by the three communities. Amherst isn't going to go in and just make the decision for everybody. You know, we're going to have the meeting and have the discussion with leadership. And that decision will be made and then Amherst just signs the contract, but it's not Amherst's decision. I just want to be very, very clear about that. Carol? I've been through this process many times and I, I guess I would want to have a, an identified process because it does happen so fast on the day of, I think we have to have, if we're allowing one person to be the decision maker, that person has to know what the other community's priorities are. And I think that's a little tougher done than said maybe, but, but I think we would need to kind of hash that out. And the other thing I would just say, and Paul, I don't know if other communities do this too, but what I found really helpful is I would bring the mayor in for the indicative pricing, which typically happens the week prior so that, and then we'd have like a, you know, a call to go over everything. I, you know, our roles, you know, Tom, Stephanie and me are to kind of like bring the information to kind of make a recommendation based on all of our discussions and expertise and, and then, but, but ideally, you know, the mayor is the one, or the chief executive is signing this long-term very high stakes contract that they, you know, I just think it's really important that they are completely comfortable with it. And that's been an issue, you know, we just want to make sure that they are, and again, like once you get into this green, that green, I think they're kind of like go, go, go. But I think having that conversation with them, with the indicative pricing going into the actual bid day, and again, making sure that they're there, you know, I'm like, I need you by 2.30 for like five minutes, and I need you at like 11.30 to give me the green light. And, and again, it, you know, it's, it's a fun day. But I feel like we are given enough information so that it's, it's, it's not usually a surprise. It's like when we get the pricing, we already know what we're looking at kind of. So I think as much as we can front load and have those decisions, I'm just nervous because one of my top goals, obviously, is we've always supplied 100% green electricity, different shades of green, we all know that. And, and it's been process that gets refined as, as we learn more and as things change. But it's being really mindful of the price to the community. And so that's the only thing I'm really nervous about. I want to make sure that we all agree that we're, you know, we have a point where we're not going to sacrifice price for greenness, because I think there's a lot of people that will not, you know, they'll suffer. So I think we'll, I think Carol, that's the point of having the, you know, with the indicative pricing meeting. In my mind that does include the mayor and the executives. I think that's new. That's, it wasn't just for this group, it's for us with our executives, so that we have that indicative pricing meeting. And then when it comes down to the actual day of have to make the decision, it's likely going to just be the executives and staff, because we have such a small window. Yeah. That, and the decision, you know, the decision, although it has to be fast, is going to have to be made by all of the executives from the three communities. And then immerse to signs, but that's what I was trying to say before. Immers will sign, but it's not in a vacuum. It's going to be, they have to make a, that's why the indicative pricing meeting is going to be so important, because that'll be a place where a lot of what you're concerned about can get hashed out before we get to that actual decision. Does that sound reasonable? Yes. Okay. And ultimately, I mean that information on the lower left, if people want to opt out for price reasons, then that's their choice, right? I mean, we've known that we're probably not going to have a cheaper option per se, by virtue of, like that can't even be part of our objective for this, right? That was what all the testimony prep was about. So I get what you're saying, Carol. It's a delicate balance. Well, I can make a couple of predictions, and I'm willing to wager on this, that first of all, you will find out that the community very quickly will learn what a mill is, and they will know that you know, they're going to know the prices of electricity, and they're going to be on it. It's pretty remarkable how kind of educated they become. But also, you know, we were like 10 years in and still getting calls that they never got their opt out notice or, you know, never got their mailing. And so, you know, you can, there's just certain things that continue on. But I will say overall, we've experienced that as a very positive thing that makes the community very proud. And I think this, you know, I really believe that this is a great tool to use for our communities. I'm just, again, been through this. I just want to make sure everything works out. And it's great. Thank you. And actually, there are two, well, there are more than two, but one of the variables, of course, is price and each of the different offerings. But the other is duration. And so, when we're comparing or when we're educating our public to compare the what's on offer here, the understanding that the basic price changes every six months, and you don't know where that's going. And our price is established for X, whatever the term is that we decide. So there's the price and there's the duration that I think we need to emphasize. In addition to the green content of the three options. Right on. I have a hard stop here in about a minute. So, Bob, I will take it upon myself to get you and the energy committee a memo brief as it may be, just so that we're, you know, all on the same page here. And Paul, I don't know if this slide deck is something that you can or plan to share, but that might be a good attachment as well. This meeting is being recorded. So I can, it's posted on the Amherst YouTube site, but I can send it to the committee. I will because I know that Andrew and Adele were not here today. I'm sorry, Andrew and Darcy were not here today. So I will send this link out for this meeting so that they can see the recording. And then you'll have that, Tom, you can share with them. Thank you very much. I figured as much, Stephanie. All right. Have a great Friday, everyone. Thanks, Tom. Bye. Does anyone have any final questions? I'm going to put the minutes off. We'll just do it next time. So Paul, I think I just want to say thank you. This is this is like an amazing group of people to be working with here. And I'm sort of humbled by the way the opportunity of our little town to be involved with Northampton and Amherst and with your group, Paul, to make this happen. So thank you. Thank you. It's a pleasure. Great. Thank you, Bob. Adele, any, anything you want to check in about before you go? You're all set. Okay. All right. Paul, thank you so much as always. So I'll get that in the materials from you. I will share them with the group on Monday when I receive them. And then by Wednesday, I'll need any feedback. I will get any feedback to you, Paul, by Thursday, so that you can have your responses by Friday. Excellent. Thank you very much. Okay. Everybody, thank you so much and have a great weekend. Bye-bye. All right. Bye.