Until July 1, if your property was within 1000 feet of an existing transmission line, APS would extend that line to your property at no cost to you.  Land owners in rural locations have counted on this free service for years, as a means to build a more affordable home, due to the low cost of the land itself.  Land buyers often measured the distance to the existing power lines, and used that as part of the valuation for the land.  If the land was more than 1000 feet from existing power lines, the land had lower value than land that was within 1000 feet of existing power lines, all else being equal.  Land speculators watched with great interest any time power lines were extending, as they knew the existence of power lines closer to their land would increase the value.

The distance to existing power lines will still be a factor in the valuation of raw land, but now parcels that are within 1000 feet will have the additional cost of the power line extension to consider.  APS is quoting line extension costs of between $10,000 and $20,000 to land owners that previously thought this would be free.  That’s a big chunk of change, especially if the land in question was under $50,000 to begin with.

For an undetermined time period, power line extensions are subject to a $5,000 credit from APS to the land owner.  APS has not decided when their generosity will end.  My suggestion to any land owner that was getting ready to have power extended to their property:  If you can afford to do so, get the power extended now, while APS is feeling generous.  Their generosity isn’t without limits.

The reason this pricing change was made, is because the cost of the power line extensions was being paid by existing power subscribers.  APS was asking for annual rate increases of as much as 10%, citing the high cost of power line extensions as part of the reason for the rate hikes.  The change was made so that development would pay for itself.  In the future, we will probably see hookup charges for the installation of a new meter, which is also currently free.

It should be noted that SRP has not followed suit with this rule change, and currently has no plans to change their offer of extending power lines 1000 feet for free.  SRP often sets their policies in lock step with APS, so again, my advice would be to act sooner, rather than later.

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