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Lawsuit claims City of Bentonville short-changed energy credit to solar customers

The class action lawsuit claims that the city's Electrical Utility Department has been incorrectly charging solar electricity customers for at least five years.

BENTONVILLE, Ark. — A class action lawsuit was filed against the City of Bentonville alleging that the city's electric utility had been incorrectly billing customers who use and produce solar electricity.

According to the lawsuit, the Bentonville Electrical Utility Department (BEUD) was only crediting solar customers for half of the amount of extra electricity they were producing at the end of each month.

In 2014, Bentonville passed an ordinance stating that any extra electricity produced by customers that they didn't use that month could roll over into the next month, but that if there was any excess energy credit at the end of the year it wouldn't roll over to the next year.

The plaintiff of the lawsuit, Ethan Harris, claims that because BEUD only credited his bill for half of the extra energy he'd used the month before, there were incorrect energy bills overall.

The lawsuit also alleges that BEUD had let all solar credits expire after one year but continued to sell that electricity to other customers at a price, effectively using half the extra electricity produced each month to resell to customers.

Harris entered into a "Net Metering Agreement" with the city on October 18, 2022, to produce solar electricity at his residence. Harris reportedly discovered that BEUD was incorrectly billing for his energy production and filed the lawsuit on April 21, 2023.

The City of Bentonville passed City Ordinance No. 2014-80, short-titled the Bentonville Electric Utility Revised Net Metering Ordinance (Net Metering Ordinance), which states that if the solar energy exceeds the amount used by the customer, the customer "shall be credited with any excess net accumulation in the next billing period. Any net excess credit remaining at the end of the calendar year shall expire."

Lawyers representing Harris are demanding a trial by jury for the city's role in the breach of contract and a bench trial on counts two through four, which are unjust enrichment, promissory estoppel, and illegal exaction.

The value of the benefit received by BEUD from Harris’s and other customers’ energy production would be determined at trial.

Harris is an individual on behalf of several plaintiffs in the proposed class action lawsuit, which could include nearly 400 customers who were also allegedly billed incorrectly by BEUD.

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