Empire Zone Rates
Through our Empire Zone Rider (EZR), we offer businesses that locate or expand in an Economic Development Zone (now known as Empire Zones) up to ten years of deep discounts on the delivery of incremental (new) electricity and natural gas supply.
This program generally provides discounts of 50% or more from standard electric delivery rates. The customers actual discounts depend on their service classification, delivery voltage and energy use profile. The main components of the discounted EZR electric bill are:
- A standard monthly customer charge ranging from $21.02 for a small commercial customer (customers with no demand) to $3,172 per month for a large industrial customer (customers with demand >2,000 kW), depending on service classification and delivery voltage
- A transmission delivery charge—$1.89 per kW per month for demand metered customers
- A cost-based, distribution delivery charge ranging from $.00307 per kWh (3/10 of one cent per kWh) to .00705 per kWh (7/10 of one cent per kWh), depending on service classification and delivery voltage. There is no distribution delivery charge for customers taking service at sub-transmission (34.5 kV or higher) or transmission voltage (115 kV)
- An electricity supply (generation) charge, which is a simple "pass through" of market-priced, electric generation costs. This generation charge is variable and can increase or decrease monthly with the market price of electricity supply. Customer can "shop" for this portion of their electric requirements. A list of qualified energy brokers and marketers can be found at Energy Supplier List.
Natural Gas Discounts
The EZR natural gas program offers discounts that range from 3 to 5 cents per therm, depending on service classification and consumption.
Minimum Qualifications
After local and state certification, customers are eligible for a full ten years of benefits on qualifying usage; the ten year term begins with the first discounted bill. In order to access the discounted EZR rates, customers must become certified and contact National Grid within six months of locating or expanding in an EZ.
All EZR discounts are applicable only to incremental (new to National Grid), permanent electric and gas load. New customers are eligible for discounts on their entire usage. Existing National Grid customers must increase their usage in order receive discounts, as follows:
- Electric demand metered customers must increase their demand (kW) by the lesser of 100 kW or 25 percent of existing demand
- Electric non-demand metered customers must increase their usage (kWh) by at least 25 percent.
- Existing natural gas customers must also exceed historical usage in order to qualify; small general service gas customers must exceed 280 therms per month.
- A change in ownership in and of itself does not qualify for EZR discounts.
- All eligible energy use must be physically located in Empire Zone boundaries.
- Customers must remain current in their payments to National Grid.
- Customers who become "decertified" by New York State for whatever reason will no longer receive the discount.
