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Corps may soon charge for utility overuse

JACKSONVILLE, N.C. — Base residents in the habit of leaving the lights on and running the air conditioning all day should reconsider: The government may stop paying your big energy bills.

The Navy Department plans to implement a 1998 Defense Department policy directing residents of privatized housing to pay their own home energy costs if they overconsume. Likewise, families who conserve will be rewarded.

The first electric bills are years away — likely to begin between 2015 and 2016, after all privatized housing has been completed — but meters already are being installed on newly constructed and renovated homes throughout Marine Corps and Navy installations.

Meters are being attached to new and renovated homes at Camp Lejeune, N.C., said Dixie Lanier, strategic marketing manager with Atlantic Marine Corps Communities, the company that oversees base housing at installations in North Carolina and other states.

The company is about three years into its construction and renovation projects, she said, so about 25 percent to 35 percent of more than 8,000 homes now have meters. Once housing is complete, the meters will be monitored to help officials establish a utility buffer. This applies only to electricity and gas, not water or sewage.

The Corps and Navy plan to track usage for a year before setting a baseline, which will factor in things such as square footage and number of rooms, said Steve Keating, who works for the assistant Navy secretary for installations and the environment.

“If you’re within the buffer, you’re OK,” Keating said. “If you’re outside the buffer, you pay or you get a rebate.”

That means if your baseline is $100 a month and your bill is $150, you pay $50. If your bill is $50, you’ll receive $50.

The Army and Air Force already bill residents at some installations. Both services said they’ve seen a reduction in energy consumption.

Army officials reported in April that 30 percent of soldiers received refunds on their utility bills, while about one-third had to make up the difference for overstepping the baseline. The Air Force expects 70 percent of airmen will stay at or under the baseline.

The Army anticipates most of its privatized homes to be billed by 2012 and the Air Force by 2015.

About 25 percent of Marine Corps and Navy families live in base housing, Keating said.

“Three out of four Navy/Marine Corps families rent or purchase their own homes,” he said. “This allows us a level playing field.”

More than 90 percent of Marine Corps and Navy housing has been privatized since the military began its public-private housing venture in 1996. Keating said that roughly 40 percent to 45 percent of new privatized housing construction across the services has been completed.