The Law Offices of Paul G. Neilan, P.C., on behalf of the plaintiffs, said in a class action lawsuit filed on April 4 in Cook County that Commonwealth Edison, an Exelon Co. (EXC), violated an Illinois Commerce Commission or ICC order issued under Illinois' Smart Grid Act.
In exchange for annual formula rate increases, ComEd agreed to upgrade its grid, improve system reliability and install smart meters at consumers' homes and businesses. Though the ICC ordered ComEd to begin smart meter installation by fall 2012, the company unilaterally pushed back deployment until 2015.
As per the lawsuit, to cover the Smart Grid upgrades, ComEd filed for a formula rate increase of $1.915 billion with the ICC in 2011. When the ICC reduced that amount by $168 million, ComEd allegedly ignored the ICC smart meter order and said it would delay installation of smart meters by about two and a half years.
Customers are currently paying for the smart meters, even though none have been installed, the lawsuit said.
ComEd's original smart meter plan included the installation of 500,000 new smart meters on Chicago's South and West sides by 2013. The smart meters would have provided customers with $182 million in savings and other benefits, such as quicker response times to outages and the ability to participate in energy saving programs, if implemented as per the original schedule.
Chicago energy attorney Paul Neilan, who brought the suit, said, "ComEd has pulled off the biggest bait-and-switch in Illinois history. ComEd sold this legislation on the benefits of smart meters, and customers have already started paying for them. But then ComEd took the law into its own hands and willfully defied an order of the Illinois Commerce Commission. No one will so much as see a smart meter until 2015."
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