AGR Group has teamed up with Community Choice Partners in providing professional services to municipal governments embracing green-energy oriented aggregations. Below is our recent press release:
LAS VEGAS – AGR Group, LLC, a leading provider of sales and support services to the retail energy industry, is proud to announce its alliance with Community Choice Partners, Inc., a California-based collective dedicated to helping local governments organize and manage energy buying cooperatives.
Community Choice Aggregation (CCA) laws allow city and county governments to buy power on behalf of residents and businesses. In California, the programs are designed primarily in pursuit of long-term, green energy solutions, resulting in stable and competitive rates, decreased greenhouse gas emissions, and increased reliance on renewable and distributed resources. The CCA movement has become increasingly popular in California, and is also allowed by law in Massachusetts, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Illinois and Ohio. A pilot CCA program has also been approved recently in New York.
Community Choice Partners offers a turnkey solution for local governments interested in CCA, providing professional services in a variety of industry sectors at no upfront cost. The group’s areas of expertise include energy sourcing and risk management, program financing and budget forecasting, schedule coordination, utility data interchange, billing, long-term power planning, environmental policy, economic development, regulatory and legal services, and community outreach. Community Choice Partners also offers natural gas aggregation services.
AGR Group is the Customer Service and sales support vendor for Community Choice Partners.
Current CCA programs in California are actually operated on a day-to-day basis by energy retailers. Community Choice Partners represents the next step in the evolution of CCA program design, in that it has assembled a team of expert service providers to supply the necessary software platforms, expertise, and financing for the government entity to become an energy retailer itself. “We’re cutting out the middleman and offering better services at the same time” said Samuel Golding, founder of Community Choice Partners. “With our support, city and county governments are essentially becoming their own utilities, establishing stable, long-term energy programs while reducing their carbon footprint and providing service at a lower cost as compared to the incumbent utilities.”
CCP’s approach offers distinct advantages tailored to the California Community Choice industry. According to Mr. Golding, “Every single one of our prospective government clients wants to use Community Choice to build and integrate more renewable and distributed resources. Our services include sophisticated long-term power planning and commensurate regulatory engagement, the creation of ‘Virtual Power Plants’ composed of distributed resources for integration into both wholesale and local grid operations, variable renewable and distributed resource forecasting, and advanced power scheduling. We allow governments to leap-frog over existing systems to quickly establish their own ‘Utility of the Future’ – fundamentally changing and improving how the power sector is planned and operated.”
Community Choice Partners currently consults for the Sonoma Clean Power Authority, and is in discussions with a number of local governments throughout California and the country to start new Community Choice programs.
“We are very proud to offer our Customer Service resources and expertise to Community Choice Partners,” AGR Group President Matt Judkin said. “As a business, we are completely behind the move toward renewable energy, and CCA is an exciting initiative for governments to take control of their energy futures.”
About AGR Group: AGR Group, LLC, is a privately held sales and service organization founded in California. It operates call centers in Clearwater, Fla., and Las Vegas. In addition to telecom services, AGR Group and its companies provide door-to-door energy sales, commercial energy brokerage and consultation, and lead generation and data services. www.agrgroupinc.com
About Community Choice Partners: Community Choice Partners, Inc. is a benefit corporation dedicated to helping local governments achieve their energy policy goals and to expanding the Community Choice industry. Community Choice Partners coordinates multiple companies in providing “best in class” services and consulting to local governments seeking to initiate, manage, or expand Community Choice energy programs. www.communitychoicepartners.com
