April 3, 2011—Eunice Sanborn, a Texan considered the world's oldest person, died this year. She was 115, which means she lived through the invention of the automobile and the airplane, the explosion of radio and TV, the miracle of the moonshot, the marvel of the cell phone, the Internet revolution — and a system for delivering electricity that hardly has changed from the day she was born.

Electricity today is delivered to our doorsteps using the same basic mechanics employed in Thomas Edison's time. It's an antiquated "one-way" system where transmission lines funnel electricity from power plants to our homes but can't feed information about the user back the other way. That's why ComEd almost never knows about a power outage until someone reports it.

The Citizens Utility Board always has supported a "smarter" electric grid. Consider the money waste we could eliminate with a grid that transmits information back and forth between the power supplier and user. Plugged-in household appliances burn energy, even if turned off, costing the nation an estimated $11 billion a year. But "smarter" appliances could sense when they're not being used and essentially "talk back" to the grid, dialing down the power they need until they're used again. That's just the tip of the iceberg. The smart grid would create a spark — but not the kind that costs us money on our power bills. It would launch an entrepreneurial revolution that boosts the economy and brings us money-saving household innovations.

It's time for a smart-grid renaissance, but we have to do it right. Wise public policy doesn't come at any cost, and it doesn't come without detailed plans to ensure proposed "smart grid" improvements are in our best interests. That's why we have joined Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan in opposing House Bill 14, which would allow ComEd to make unspecified improvements that would purportedly advance a smart grid.

As it stands, the bill would give ComEd unlimited discretion to spend no less than $2.6 billion on whatever improvements it chooses, even if they're not beneficial to consumers. In exchange, ComEd would get automatic rate hikes that would increase power prices by 2 percent annually for 10 years.

While there's no guarantee of the bill's consumer benefits, it would do one thing: weaken the regulatory system that allows consumer advocates, such as CUB and AARP, to successfully contest ComEd rate-hike plans.

Under current law, rate-hike proposals are subject to a thorough 11-month review by state regulators. This process affords consumer advocates time to educate regulators on aspects of the proposal that undermine the public interest. But HB 14 would exempt rate hikes from the 11-month review and give regulators as little as 45 days, after the fact, to assess whether they're justified.

In effect, this bill replaces regulatory checks and balances with a blank check for ComEd to raise our rates.

CUB looks forward to working with all parties to improve the legislation. But in its current form, this proposed method of constructing a smart grid is just unwise.