Utility Consumer Participation Board

Public Act 304 of 1982, as amended, provides for the establishment and implementation of gas and power supply cost recovery clauses in the rates and rate schedules of public utilities. The Utility Consumer Participation Board (UCPB) and the Utility Consumer Representation Fund (UCRF) were created by the Act to achieve equitable representation of interest of energy utility customers in energy cost recovery proceedings.

The purpose of the UCPB is to make grants from the fund to qualified nonprofit organizations and local units of government to represent the interests of residential utility customers before the Michigan Public Service Commission.

Public Act 341 was passed on December 15, 2016, and signed by Governor Rick Snyder on December 21, 2016. PA 341 of 2016 updates Michigan’s energy laws relating to utility rate cases, electric choice, certificate of necessity, and electric capacity resource adequacy, and establishes an integrated resource planning process.

The law took effect on April 20, 2017. The law expanded the UCPB’s scope of cases that were allowed to use UCRF grants for residential rate payers.

The scope of the UCPB representation on behalf of residential rate payers was expanded again in PA 231 of 2023 to include interest of residential consumers includes such things as considerations of the affordability of utility service in this state, the reduction of greenhouse gas emission from the utility sector and protection of public health, equitable access to energy efficiency, weatherization, efficient electrification measures, programs, and services, and clean energy technologies.

The bill requires the Utility Consumer Participation Board to encourage grant-making to nonprofits representing environmental justice communities and communities with the highest energy burdens. The bill also allows money in the Utility Consumer Representation Fund to be used for participation in administrative and judicial proceedings under section 6w of the Electric Transmission Line Certification Act and under sections 22 and 73 of the Clean and Renewable Energy and Energy Waste Reduction Act.

Public Act 3 of 1937 – MCL 460.6m

The UCRF funds collected are split between the Attorney General (AG) and the UCPB. The Attorney General uses the funding to advocate on behalf of the interests of the State of Michigan utility customers in general, and the UCPB is responsible for granting funding to specific interest groups to advocate on behalf of the residential consumer groups they represent.

Combined, the grantees represent statewide nonprofit groups with tens of thousands of individual members focused on issues related to energy costs, consumer protection, environmental, public health, emerging energy, energy conservation and community action.

The actions of these grantees influence energy costs for more than 3 million residential natural gas customers and 3.5 million residential electric customers in the State of Michigan. In 2024, UCRF grant recipients participated in proceedings on behalf of residential customers in the State of Michigan.

UCRF funds helped Michigan citizen advocates achieve, directly and in collaboration with other parties, significant benefits for residential utility customers across the state. In certain cases, UCRF grantees were the only advocates for Michigan residential customers.

Major areas of impact for residential customers included PSCR-related decisions on transfer prices, fuel transportation costs, reliability and adequacy of electricity supply, PSCR 5-year and load forecasting, offsets to Gas Cost Recovery (GCR) cost of gas sold to GCR customers, monitoring developments at the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO), Rate Cases, Integrated Resource Plans (IRP), energy waste reduction, purchase power agreements, non-volumetric charges, low income residential customers, refunds, classification of utility scale battery storage, evaluation of projects, cost of service expenses, contingency allowances, moratorium on new rate case, extension of leases, modeling deficiencies, value of solar, outflow credit for distributed generation, distributed generation and low-income communities, low-income renewables programs.