PhillyDeals: Peco's commercial shutoffs double

Peco Energy Co.

says more Philadelphia-area businesses have fallen behind on basic utility payments.

Peco has shut off 4,553 commercial electricity or gas users in the Philadelphia area so far this year, more than double the 1,757 stopped by this time last year, said spokesman Ben Armstrong.

The company blames the weak economy. "Across our small and midsize business customers, we are seeing businesses fall further and further behind on their payments," Armstrong told me.

Delinquencies more than doubled earlier this year, but October data suggest things have lately been getting worse more slowly: Peco recorded 235 commercial shutoffs for the month, less than double last October's 145.

Separately, Peco data that will be released by the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission this week show a big drop in the number of homes where it shut off gas in October, compared with last year.

Peco home shutoffs totaled nearly 8,000, down from 19,000 a year ago.

Peco says it expected this drop by more than doubling shutoffs last spring, to 34,000 through April, up from 16,000 a year earlier. That followed a tougher warning policy: By cutting off late-payers and nonpayers in the spring, instead of letting those who'd been shut off slide through summer as it used to, Peco hoped they would need to pay less to get reconnected before the heating season returned with deadly cold.

The question now is whether a smaller number of shutoffs this fall and winter will justify the larger number of shutoffs last spring, said Phil Bertocci, utility lawyer for Community Legal Services of Philadelphia.

Year-to-date, total Peco residential shutoffs are down a little, to about 74,000, from 78,000.

Harrisburg is so eager to back "clean energy," it's offering public money to people who, in some cases, aren't quite ready to spend it.

Gov. Rendell last week announced $23 million in loans and grants to 36 developers, companies, and towns for solar and geothermal energy projects. The program is funded by a state bond sale, state spokesman Steve Weitzman told me.

The state says it will finance, among others:

A $2.55 million loan for a proposed $6.1 million rooftop solar-electric system on an office building managed by Cushman & Wakefield Inc. in Fort Washington.

The state announced that SunEdison L.L.C., of Beltsville, Md., would build this system. But the owner of the 360,000-square-foot office building, at 500 Virginia Dr., hasn't decided yet whether SunEdison or someone else will do the job, says a representative of building owner APF Properties L.L.C., of New York, who spoke on condition he not be identified.

$1.02 million for a loan guarantee to developer Earth Rising Ventures Inc.'s $7.8 million solar-heated, geothermal-cooled project in Kimberton, East Pikeland Township, including 21 condo homes and 7,000 square feet of commercial space.

The state guarantee helps, but Earth Rising is still waiting to raise financing for the development, which might start a year from now, Earth Rising owner Dan Orzech told me.

A $649,000 grant toward a $2.3 million Borrego Solar Systems Inc. solar-electric system at Tasty Baking Co.'s new plant in South Philadelphia. "We're glad to be a part of this idea, but it's very much in the infancy stage, and details have yet to be worked out," said Tasty spokesman Chad Ramsey.

A $459,000 loan toward an $8.2 million geothermal heat pump system for the proposed Sun Center Studios, Chester Township.

A deal to build the $85.8 million studio is scheduled to close Dec. 15, investor and Philadelphia lawyer Jeff Rotwitt of Obermayer, Rebmann, Maxwell & Hippel L.L.P. told me.

Rotwitt said he was planning the complex, with "sweetening" from property-tax breaks by Delaware County and Chester Upland School District, with partner Hal Katersky's Pacifica Ventures, a U.S.-Canadian partnership that built another studio in New Mexico. There's no movie currently "in the pipeline," Rotwitt added, but he's hoping to land something after construction starts.