GLASGOW – Citing expected changes in what the Tennessee Valley Authority charges utilities for electricity, Glasgow Electric Plant Board Superintendent Billy Ray predicted Tuesday that the EPB will have to discuss increasing customer rates in the next few years.

A presentation by Ray and Melanie Reed, EPB’s chief financial officer, indicated that the customer charge, currently a flat monthly rate, will gradually increase over the next five years.

“Our fixed cost or our customer charge, whatever you want to call it, is going to have to start going up sharply because TVA is going to start charging us (more) for it,” Ray said at a meeting of the EPB’s board of directors.

TVA data show the provider plans to gradually increase the customer charge for utilities. No precise figures were provided.

Reed predicted the EPB board has about two years before it needs to make a decision on increasing the monthly customer charge, which is about $22 now.

“At some point before 2019, we will have to discuss some type of increase in our rates,” she said.

Ray said the reason TVA will increase the base customer charge is because it is now possible for individual utilities to lower demand, which lowers the cost of producing electricity.

The EPB rate structure introduced in January 2016, which charges about $11 per kilowatt/hour during the hour of each month when demand is highest, has lowered the amount of electricity being used during each month’s peak period.

“Because of the way the wholesale rate presently functions, our net cost per kilowatt/hour goes down,” he said. “TVA has noticed that if everybody started doing that and they began to collect a lot less revenue from their demand charge, then their financial house of cards would collapse.”

In another matter, the board voted to move May’s board meeting from May 23 to May 30 because Ray will be at the Tennessee Valley Public Power Association conference May 23.

Ray also announced the EPB’s legal representation of attorneys Jeff Herbert and John David Cole met with Danny Basil, an attorney the Glasgow City Council hired as legal counsel in the event of a lawsuit with the EPB.

Basil’s hiring came shortly after the EPB threatened legal action in response to city council member Jake Dickinson’s request that city attorney Rich Alexander write three motions calling for the removal of EPB directors Norma Redford, Jeff Harned and Cheryl Ambach from office for inefficiency and/or neglect of duties.

“There’s been some kind of communication between they and Danny Basil on that matter and all I can report is there’s conversations going on,” Ray said.

– Follow reporter Jackson French on Twitter @Jackson_French or visit bgdailynews.com.