No diesel surcharge on power bills this year, utility says

Petersburg Municipal Power and Light will not add a diesel surcharge to customers’ bills this year to recover the cost of running the borough’s generators during the annual Southeast Alaska Power Agency (SEAPA) maintenance shutdown, Utility Director Steve Harbour told the Borough Assembly on Monday.

Each summer, SEAPA takes its transmission system offline for maintenance, and Petersburg must power the community entirely from its own generation. Roughly 75% of the borough’s electricity normally comes from SEAPA, with the remaining quarter generated locally by the Blind Slough hydro plant and se...