By Brad Dolinski, CEO
April 2026
Good afternoon NIECI!
With a little luck spring might just hang in there this time. We’ve had some glimmers of hope and I’m ready to transition. I want the open water season. I am ready for the side by sides to come out in force. I’m ready for what is to come. Our Board of Directors and I traveled down to the Capitol this week. We visited with our legislators and friends. I was extremely excited to see Senator John Hoffman. John and I have become friends over the past several years. He doesn’t represent our area, but he represents Minnesota. John was attacked this past summer; shot nine times. He is still serving in the Minnesota Senate and wishes to run in the upcoming election. John cares about Minnesota and improving the lives of all Minnesotans. Extremely nice to see Senator Hoffman! We were fortunate enough to have several of our legislators join us for supper. We team with Lake Country Power, Arrowhead, Co-op Light and Power, Mille Lacs, and North Star Electric. This team approach allows us to combine forces and visit with legislators we otherwise may not have a chance to spend time with. We were able to visit about net metering. If solar installations are not sized to load, we have cost shifting between members. We don’t have an issue with solar. If Member-Owners want to install it, great! I do not like when North Itasca Electric is forced to purchase the power from a system that is overbuilt for more than I must pay Great River Energy for the same power. Solar power has a place in our mix of resources; it does not pencil out at utility scale currently. Mr. Mark Bakk told us a riveting story about resources in general. He talked to us about a battlefield. The opposition is the electric load coming at us. Our knights in fancy uniforms were solar resources and wind. At night half of them disappeared from the battle; the sun went down. During the cold snap in January, the wind didn’t blow and we lost all our wind soldiers. We have other soldiers; they come and go at will. These are off-peak programs; we can call on them to slow the attack from load when needed. Our front line is still hardened by coal, natural gas, and nuclear power. This is the wall of resources that have been fighting the good fight for years. We need them to continue to win against a growing load. Sorry, Mark, if I butchered a great speech. I spent my time talking about transmission investments being made today, along with nuclear power. It was a sight to see at the Capitol. There were bucket trucks out front with a huge American Flag hoisted between them. We were able to take part in a nuclear energy discussion where Representative Igo and Senator Hauschild both spoke in favor of nuclear energy. We are close to passing a bill for a nuclear energy study in Minnesota. This is a very thoughtful approach prior to asking to lift the nuclear moratorium. I just want to thank Minnesota Rural Electric Association. They put together a great meeting and a great opportunity to engage with our legislators. Job well done!
By your side! Miigwech
Brad
March 2026
Good afternoon NIECI,
We had a serious blast of winter followed by a glimpse of spring. This swing in temperatures and winter conditions had some serious effects on our industry. I will dive into this shortly.
On the positive side, all our snowmobilers out there are grinning ear to ear with the arrival of snow. I know a group of anglers excited for a lucrative annual fishing event happening this weekend. Events like these bring out the fun winter in Talmoon has to offer. Thanks Jim, your efforts put smiles on many faces! During January we had ten days of extreme cold conditions. So, we say it gets cold in northern Minnesota every year. This event was important because the cold spread across the nation. When the temperature drops across the nation the demand for natural gas increases dramatically. Many power supply peaking plants operate off this same supply of natural gas, very large amounts of natural gas. This will cause dramatic supply and demand pricing spikes in MISO. Along with the limitations of natural gas there were other significant impacts to note. The DC line from North Dakota to Minneapolis had an issue. This led to one of the circuits remaining down during the freeze. The wind did not blow significantly during this time either. We have a large reliance on wind power in Minnesota: when the wind doesn’t blow, we need power from other sources. Thankfully our peaking fleet responded to the need for reliability. The fleet was forced to run on fuel oil during the cold snap because of the price and availability of natural gas. This came at a cost in MISO. Local market pricing in our MISO Zone hit an average of $265/MWh with a peak of $704/MWh. In context we expect to pay in the range of roughly $25-$57/MWh for the same power costs. This leads me to the point that I need to make. I need to discuss the Power Cost Adjustment with our Board of Directors this month. NIECI received a PCA of roughly $120,000 from the cold snap in January. This PCA is charged to us when events outside the control of GRE happen. Our Board of Directors has the decision to pass these charges back to members or hold them depending on the situation. NIECI used to pass the PCA, no matter the amount, monthly back to the member. We haven’t done this for several years. We may need to pull this lever once again. If the board chooses to pass the PCA to members, I will recommend spreading it over several months. Possibly with favorable conditions in MISO we could see reduced charges. Worst case scenario, we will have to pay about $.02/kWh more for the power we consumed in January. I will keep you posted on the results of this situation as I know more.
By your side! Miigwech
Brad
