Chicago sets brisk timeline for electric aggregation deal

The City of Chicago laid out a timeline Thursday for how it intends to quickly complete a deal that would move approximately 950,000 Chicagoans to a new electricity supplier.

The timing of the deal is important because Chicagoans stand to save the most money over Commonwealth Edison's rate between now and June 2013, when ComEd's prices are expected to drop because pricey contracts they entered into years ago will expire. The timeline has Chicagoans moving to the new supplier in February 2013.

In Tuesday's election, Chicago voters passed a proposal to allow the city to negotiate for better electricity prices on behalf of residential customers and small businesses. The city is one of hundreds of Illinois communities participating in so-called electricity aggregation and is by far the largest city in the nation to attempt such a large bulk purchase for electricity.

Michael Negron, deputy chief of policy and strategic planning for the mayor's office, said electricity suppliers have shown great interest in snagging Chicago's service. Nearly 100 people packed a conference Monday for the city's "request for qualifications" process. The bidders ranged from multi-billion corporations to smaller providers from all over the country, he said. Industry analysts say the deal could be worth hundreds of millions of dollar to the winning supplier or suppliers.

The timeline is as follows:

Nov. 14: Municipal aggregation ordinance introduced as substitute ordinance in city finance committee

Nov. 21: Bidder responses to request for qualifications due

Nov. 26 - Dec. 11: Finance committee will conduct two public hearings on aggregation ordinance

Early December: City and Delta Institute convene stakeholder process for identifying options for a portion of savings to go toward increased energy efficiency or the development of cleaner, renewable energy sources.

Dec. 5: Qualified pool of energy providers announced

Dec. 6: Issuance of request for pricing; responses due within days. The sole selection criteria at this point will be price because the RFQ phase will have screened out bidders based on their capacity, financial stability, customer service and ability to deliver cleaner energy.

Dec. 12: City Council considers aggregation ordinance

Mid/Late-December: Opt-out letters are sent to approximately 1 million customers

Early January: Opt-out data processed and final customer list prepared.

February: Participating Chicago customers are switched over the course of the month

March: All Chicago ratepayers who have not opted out are under the new supplier. City will announce its plan for investment of savings into cleaner energy or improved energy efficiency.

Read more about the Chicago electricity deal.

jwernau@tribune.com | Twitter @littlewern

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Mayor hopes Obama's 2nd term proves fruitful for funding

As he looks ahead to President Barack Obama's second term, Mayor Rahm Emanuel expects funding for roads and mass transit and a push for education reform to be high on the White House's to-do list.

Not surprisingly, those agenda items also are close to Emanuel's heart.

"As a mayor, one of the key goals the president mentioned, as you know I talked a lot about investing in our infrastructure so we can grow our economy," Emanuel said late Tuesday at McCormick Place. "And the president has committed as part of his jobs plan and economic plan to invest in our roads, our bridges, our airports, our mass transit."

The perception endures that local governments benefit from close relationships with federal officials when largesse flows from Washington, D.C., to cities and states. Emanuel is particularly tight with Obama, having served as his chief of staff before returning to their shared hometown to run for mayor.

Emanuel also was a key campaign surrogate for Obama, traveling to Florida and Ohio on his behalf in recent weeks, raising money for an Obama-aligned super PAC and appearing repeatedly on Sunday morning talk shows to make the president's case.

"I don't think it's an overstatement to say there is no mayor in America that has a better link to the White House than Mayor Emanuel. But that's self-evident," said Ald. Edward Burke, 14th, when asked whether Obama's Tuesday win strengthens the mayor.

Ald. Patrick O'Connor, 40th, the mayor's City Council floor leader, said Obama may be in a better position to loosen the federal purse strings in a second term.

"I think that from the standpoint of a president now who isn't looking at a re-election coming up in his rearview mirror all the time, he might be a little more free to do things for the entire country," O'Connor said. "I would hope that would include Chicago."

Emanuel has worked hard to position himself as a mayor who builds things. He formed an infrastructure trust to find ways for moneyed interests to back public projects while getting a return on their investments. And he raised water and sewer fees as a way to pay for a makeover of Chicago's aging underground pipes.

Among recent federally funded infrastructure projects, dozens of miles of the city's arterial streets were resurfaced using federal stimulus money after Obama took office. Stimulus money helped pay for the $20 million revamp of Congress Parkway in the South Loop. And the $133 million Englewood Flyover rail bridge project was covered almost entirely by federal money.

But Emanuel has expressed disappointment with the piecemeal nature of federal funding programs. He hopes that changes in Obama's second term.

"I've been talking about that, it's key for our economic growth, it's key for our job creation," the mayor said. "And that would be helpful if we got an infrastructure, highway, mass transit bill that cities like Chicago, cities across America, regardless of size, will have the investments necessary to move their economies forward."

Among the major transportation projects the mayor hopes to find federal funding for is the extension of the Red Line from 95th Street to 130th Street. Estimates in recent years have put the price tag for that undertaking at more than $1.4 billion.

In addition, Emanuel said he expects Obama to continue "strengthening education, and pushing even further on Race to the Top." Emanuel helped design the president's signature national education initiative, which requires school districts to compete for funding.

Tribune reporter Hal Dardick contributed.

jebyrne@tribune.com

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Siemens to sharpen its game with 6 billion euros of savings

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“Ode to Joy” for Royal Philharmonic Society’s 200th

LONDON (Reuters) – The British music society that commissioned Beethoven to write his Ninth Symphony and its “Ode to Joy” announced on Wednesday it will celebrate the society’s 2013 bicentenary by showing off its manuscript of the work on both sides of the Atlantic.

The Royal Philharmonic Society, founded in London in January, 1813, also will sponsor performances of Beethoven’s last symphony, splash out on commissions of new music and will digitize its archive held at the British Library, the society announced in the London pub where its founders used to meet.

“Some of the most famous works in the classical repertoire were either commissioned by the Philharmonic Society or premiered in the UK at Philharmonic Society concerts,” John Gilhooly, the society’s Irish chairman, told reporters.

“Works by Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Schumann, Rachmaninov, Sibelius, Wagner, Brahms, Bruckner and Delius, Debussy and Shostakovich, to name but a few,” Gilhooly continued, adding that the society had commissioned “over 60 composers in the last decade alone”.

The society will participate in exhibits in New York and London featuring manuscript versions of Beethoven’s last symphony which contains the “Ode to Joy” that has become a theme song for world peace and freedom.

The society’s archives record that in 1817 it paid Beethoven 50 guineas for the work. The society, which is not publicly funded and is financed by donations, got the “royal” tag in its centenary year.

Gilhooly said a much-photographed and copied bust of Beethoven that the society owns would be making a return visit to concert stages after having been squirreled away in the RPS headquarters for most of the past 30 years.

“It’s going to be a bit like the Olympic torch,” Gilhooly said. “It’s busted out in preparation for a grand tour.”

Founded by a group of professional musicians to make classical music available to a wider audience, the RPS said it was commissioning 16 new works by such prominent composers as Harrison Birtwistle, Wolfgang Rihm and Magnus Lindberg, some of them in conjunction with the Britten-Pears Foundation which is celebrating the centenary of British composer Benjamin Britten.

“I very much admire that they are sponsoring young composers, older composers, making it possible that music, even avant garde or little known music, is written and performed,” Alfred Brendel, one of the world’s most distinguished pianists and a RPS gold medal recipient, who retired from public performance several years ago, told Reuters at the launch event.

The exhibit of letters and manuscripts will be mounted in cooperation with the British Library and the Morgan Library and the Juilliard School of music in New York, which holds another copy of the Beethoven Ninth.

The American and British manuscripts of the symphony, annotated by Beethoven, will be seen together side by side for the first time since 1824 in New York later in the year, the society said.

(Editing by Paul Casciato)

Music News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Recipes for Health: Cabbage, Onion and Millet Kugel — Recipes for Health

Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times

Light, nutty millet combines beautifully with the sweet, tender cabbage and onions in this kugel. I wouldn’t hesitate to serve this as a main dish.

 

1/2 medium head cabbage (1 1/2 pounds), cored and cut in thin strips

Salt to taste

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

1 medium onion, finely chopped

1/4 cup chopped fresh dill

Freshly ground pepper

1 cup low-fat cottage cheese

2 eggs

2 cups cooked millet

 

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Oil a 2-quart baking dish. Toss the cabbage with salt to taste and let it sit for 10 minutes.

2. Meanwhile, heat 1 tablespoon of the oil over medium heat in a large, heavy skillet and add the onion. Cook, stirring, until it begins to soften, about 3 minutes, then add a generous pinch of salt and turn the heat to medium-low. Cook, stirring often, until the onion is soft and beginning to color, about 10 minutes. Add the cabbage, turn the heat to medium, and cook, stirring often, until the cabbage is quite tender and fragrant, 10 to 15 minutes. Stir in the dill, taste and adjust salt, and add pepper to taste. Transfer to a large bowl.

3. In a food processor fitted with the steel blade, purée the cottage cheese until smooth. Add the eggs and process until the mixture is smooth. Add salt (I suggest about 1/2 teaspoon) and pepper and mix together. Scrape into the bowl with the cabbage. Add the millet and stir everything together. Scrape into the oiled baking dish. Drizzle the remaining oil over the top and place in the oven.

4. Bake for about 40 minutes, until the sides are nicely browned and the top is beginning to color. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for at least 15 minutes before serving. Serve warm or at room temperature, cut into squares or wedges.

Yield: 6 servings.

Advance preparation: The cooked millet will keep in the refrigerator for 3 to 4 days and freezes well. The kugel will keep for 3 days in the refrigerator. Reheat in a medium oven.

Nutritional information per serving (6 servings): 195 calories; 7 grams fat; 1 gram saturated fat; 1 gram polyunsaturated fat; 4 grams monounsaturated fat; 64 milligrams cholesterol; 23 grams carbohydrates; 4 grams dietary fiber; 148 milligrams sodium (does not include salt to taste); 10 grams protein

Martha Rose Shulman is the author of “The Very Best of Recipes for Health.”

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What electricity aggregation means for your bill

Voters in 81 communities in Commonwealth Edison's service territory voted Tuesday to allow their local governments to shop for electricity on their behalf.

Vote totals are being tallied, but early results indicate that measures to allow so-called electricity aggregation passed in the vast majority of communities, including Chicago.

Illinois consumers have been allowed to shop for electricity for more than a decade, but the concept didn't take off until 2011, when legislators enacted a law allowing municipalities to negotiate for better rates on behalf of residents.

If your town voted yes to aggregation, here's what you need to know:

The switch to a new supplier won't happen right away.

Even with referendum passage, the process is just beginning. Communities need time to invite suppliers to bid, create a plan of governance, reach out to residents, choose a supplier and provide an opt-out period. Based on past deals, you can expect to be switched over to a new supplier sometime from January to March.

You will have an opportunity to opt out.

Check your mailbox in the coming months for instructions from your municipality about how to opt out of the program. If you opt out, you will remain with ComEd or you can shop for electricity on your own.

You can do nothing.

Unless you opt out, you will be automatically switched to the supplier your municipality chooses. Excluded are customers who have switched to suppliers of their own choosing or who are on an alternative pricing plan with ComEd. In general, those customers have not been included in aggregation deals.

You are a ComEd customer.

ComEd is responsible for delivering your electricity and keeping the lights on, regardless of who supplies your power. ComEd, a "wires only" utility, makes its money from delivering electricity, not from supplying it. Your new bill will look like your old bill, except that the portion titled "electricity supply services" will have a new rate and include the new supplier's name.

You are not alone.

Residents of 175 ComEd communities have switched suppliers and have cut their bills about in half through May 2013, paying an average of 4.83 cents per kilowatt-hour.

Customer beware, you may not save money.

Electricity pricing is constantly changing, and deals that look good now may not look great later. Several municipalities are locked into 12- and 24-month contracts with alternative suppliers that are higher than what consumers could find by shopping on their own, and they come with early termination fees. Some towns have not required suppliers to beat ComEd's prices if they drop below current rates. Some have customers automatically stay on with a supplier after a contract expires, even if rates increase.

Expect to be popular.

Electricity suppliers will hound you to pick them and opt out of aggregation. In the process, savvy consumers may be able to snag discounts on hotels and restaurants. But if you plan to shop, refer to the Illinois Commerce Commission (pluginillinois.org), Power2Switch (power2switch.com) and the Citizens Utility Board (citizensutilityboard.org).

Beware of scammers.

About 44 percent of people know nothing about electricity aggregation, according to a recent poll, which can make them ripe for victimization by scammers and identity thieves. You do not have to sign anything or provide personal information to be part of municipal aggregation.

SOURCES: City of Chicago, Power2Switch, Citizens Utility Board, Commonwealth Edison, Environmental Law & Policy Center

jwernau@tribune.com

Twitter @littlewern

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OBAMA VICTORY SPEECH: 'THE BEST IS YET TO COME'

President Obama thanked his supporters, spoke about unity and said he wants to work with Republicans and Democrats to move the country forward. He also said he plans to meet with Mitt Romney to discuss how they can work together.

President Barack Obama rolled to re-election Tuesday night, vanquishing former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney despite a weak economy that plagued his first term and put a crimp in the middle class dreams of millions. In victory, he confidently promised better days ahead.

Obama spoke to thousands of cheering supporters in his hometown of Chicago, praising Romney and declaring his optimism for the next four years. “While our road has been hard, though our journey has been long, we have picked ourselves up, we have fought our way back and we know in our hearts that for the United States of America, the best is yet to come,” he said.

Romney made a brief, graceful concession speech before a disappointed crowd in Boston. He summoned all Americans to pray for Obama and urged the night's political winners to put partisan bickering aside and “reach across the aisle” to tackle the nation's problems.

Still, after the costliest — and one of the nastiest — campaigns in history, divided government was alive and well.

Democrats retained control of the Senate with surprising ease. With three races too close to call, they had the possibility of gaining a seat.

Republicans won the House, ensuring that Speaker John Boehner of Ohio, Obama's partner in unsuccessful deficit talks, would reclaim his seat at the bargaining table. With numerous races as yet uncalled, the size of the GOP majority was unknown.

At Obama headquarters in Chicago, a huge crowd gathered waving small American flags and cheering. Supporters hugged each other, danced and pumped their fists in the air. Excited crowds also gathered in New York's Times Square, at Faneuil Hall in Boston and near the White House in Washington, drivers joyfully honking as they passed by.

With returns from 88 percent of the nation's precincts, Obama had 55.8 million, 49.8 percent of the popular vote. Romney had 54.5 million, or 48.6 percent.

The president's laserlike focus on the battleground states allowed him to run up a 303-206 margin in the competition for the 270 electoral votes needed to win the White House, the count that mattered most. Remarkably, given the sour economy, he lost only two states that he captured in 2008, Indiana and North Carolina.

Florida, another Obama state four years ago, remained too close to call.

The election emerged as a choice between two very different visions of government — whether it occupies a major, front-row place in American lives or is in the background as a less-obtrusive facilitator for private enterprise and entrepreneurship.

The economy was rated the top issue by about 60 percent of voters surveyed as they left their polling places. But more said former President George W. Bush bore responsibility for current circumstances than Obama did after nearly four years in office.

That boded well for the president, who had worked to turn the election into a choice between his proposals and Romney's, rather than a simple referendum on the economy during his time in the White House.

Unemployment stood at 7.9 percent on Election Day, higher than when the president took office. And despite signs of progress, the economy is still struggling after the worst recession in history.

Obama captured Ohio, Wisconsin, Iowa, Virginia, New Hampshire, Colorado and Nevada, seven of the nine states where the rivals and their allies poured nearly $1 billion into dueling television commercials.

Romney won North Carolina among the battleground states.

Florida was too close to call, Obama leading narrowly in a state where there were still long lines of voters at some polling places long after the appointed closing time.

Romney, who grew wealthy in business and ran the 2002 Olympic Games in Salt Lake City before entering politics, spoke only briefly to supporters, some of whom wept.

“I so wish that I had been able to fulfill your hopes to lead the country in a different direction,” he said. “But the nation chose another leader and so Ann and I join with you to earnestly pray for him and for this great nation.”

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Move over, Obama; Twitter had a big night too

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Quiet media night explodes suddenly, Rove protests

NEW YORK (AP) — Careful media coverage of a close presidential election Tuesday exploded so suddenly Tuesday that it left the bizarre spectacle of Fox News Channel analyst Karl Rove, a major fundraiser for Republican Mitt Romney, publicly questioning his network’s declaration that President Barack Obama had been re-elected.

ABC News was also frantically trying to repair a power outage that left much of its set inoperable precisely at the time the election was being decided.

For several hours, election coverage resembled the run-up to a Super Bowl, with plenty of talk signifying little. Then NBC News, at 11:12 p.m. ET, was the first to declare Obama had won by virtue of winning the battleground state of Ohio. “He remains president of the United States for a second term,” said anchor Brian Williams.

Other networks followed suit, including Fox five minutes later. But Rove, the former top political aide to President George W. Bush whose on-air presence on Fox this campaign raised some eyebrows because of his prominent role supporting Romney, suggested the call was premature.

“We’ve got to be careful about calling things when we have like 991 votes separating the candidates and a quarter of the vote left to count … I’d be very cautious about intruding in this process,” said Rove, a behind-the-scenes player in the wild 2000 election between Bush and Al Gore that took weeks to decide. (Gore was on TV Tuesday, too, as anchor of Current TV’s election coverage).

It left Rove’s colleagues struggling for words.

“That’s awkward,” said co-anchor Megyn Kelly. She then went backstage to interview on camera two men who were part of Fox’s team in charge of making election calls. They had concluded that based on the precincts where votes were left to be counted, Romney couldn’t beat Obama.

Later, Rove tried to make light of the encounter. “This is not a cage match,” he said. “This is a light intellectual discussion.”

As the evening had progressed for Fox and it became clear that Romney, the clear favorite of most of its audience, would find it hard to win, commentators like Sarah Palin and Peggy Noonan looked stricken.

“This was the referendum that Mitt Romney wanted on Barack Obama,” said Huffington Post’s Howard Fineman on MSNBC. “And guess what? Barack Obama won the referendum. And that’s pretty darned emphatic.”

Much of ABC’s New York election studio was left powerless for about 20 minutes at the height of Tuesday’s coverage. The network didn’t inform viewers, and tried to compensate by taking anchors Diane Sawyer and George Stephanopoulos away from their desks, and cutting away to crowd shots at Times Square.

Sawyer’s relaxed, folksy delivery in her first presidential election night as anchor drew considerable social media attention. The rock group They Might Be Giants tweeted: “and Diane Sawyer declares tonight’s winner is … chardonnay!”

Sawyer and Stephanopoulos were a new election anchor team for ABC, and Scott Pelley led the CBS coverage. Of the three anchors for the biggest broadcast networks, only NBC’s Williams was a returnee from 2008.

But it was a far different media world anyway. 2012 was notable for the vast array of outlets that an interested consumer could command to create their own media experience on multiple screens. Web sites offered deep drill-downs in data and social media hosted raucous conversations.

“If you started a drinking game with the words ‘exit poll’ in it, please stop now. You will die!” tweeted TV critic Tim Goodman.

Obama’s Twitter account tweeted a picture of the president hugging First Lady Michelle Obama, and within 45 minutes it was retweeted more than 300,000 times.

Earlier in the evening, journalists took special care not to rely too heavily on exit polls. Perhaps they remembered how misleading exit polls in 2004 led TV networks astray then or perhaps, in CBS’ Bob Schieffer’s words, its results this year were too contradictory.

News outlets carefully parsed information and sometimes used the same facts for contradictory conclusions.

Fox News analyst Brit Hume noted an exit poll finding that 42 percent of voters said Superstorm Sandy was an important factor in their vote, suggesting that was a positive for Obama since he was widely considered to have been effective in his response. With the same information, the web site Politico headlined: “Exit Survey: Sandy Not a Factor.”

There was a certain amount of vamping time, too. Glenn Beck’s online network, The Blaze, had a blackboard straight out of the 1960s as a tote board. Beck killed time on the air by asking for cookie dough ice cream from the on-set food bar.

“Waffle cone, please,” Beck said.

When Sawyer asked David Muir for the latest news from the Romney campaign, he reported the family had pasta for dinner and the candidate indulged in his favorite peanut butter and honey sandwich.

The media personality with perhaps the most on the line was Nate Silver of The New York Times, whose FiveThirtyEight blog was sought out by 20 percent of the people who visited the newspaper’s website on Monday. He has used statistical data throughout the campaign to predict an Obama victory and by Tuesday, had forecast a 90.9 percent chance that Obama would win.

After Obama’s victory became clear, Gavin Purcell, producer of “Late Night with Jimmy Fallon,” tweeted that “Nate Silver is the only white male winning tonight.” CNN’s Piers Morgan tweeted Silver an invitation to appear on his show Wednesday.

___

Television Writers Frazier Moore in New York and Lynn Elber in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

Entertainment News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Recipes for Health: Sweet Millet Kugel — Recipes for Health

Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times

Millet, a light, fluffy gluten-free grain that is a good source of magnesium, manganese and phosphorus, lends itself beautifully to both sweet and savory kugels. In fact, this kugel turned me into a millet convert.

 

2/3 cup millet

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

2 cups water

Salt to taste

1 cup cottage cheese

3 eggs

1/4 cup low-fat milk

1/4 cup mild honey or agave nectar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg

1/2 cup (3 ounces) diced dried apricots

1/2 cup (3 ounces) raisins (or omit and use all apricots)

Finely grated zest of 1 lemon

 

1. Heat 1 tablespoon of the butter or oil over medium-high heat in a heavy 2- or 3-quart saucepan. Meanwhile, bring the water to a simmer in another saucepan or in the microwave. Add the millet to the heavy saucepan and toast, stirring, until it begins to smell fragrant and toasty, about 5 minutes. Add the boiling water and salt to taste, and bring back to a boil. Reduce the heat to low, cover and simmer 25 to 30 minutes, until the liquid in the saucepan has evaporated and the grains are fluffy. Transfer to a large bowl.

2. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 2-quart baking dish. In a food processor fitted with the steel blade, blend the cottage cheese until smooth. Add the milk, eggs, vanilla and nutmeg and blend until smooth. Scrape into the bowl with the millet.

3. Stir together the millet and cottage cheese mixture. Stir in the apricots, raisins and lemon zest. Scrape into the prepared baking dish. Cut the remaining butter into small pieces and dot the top of the kugel with them. Bake 40 to 50 minutes, until the kugel is set and beginning to color on the top.

4. Remove from the heat and allow to cool for at least 15 minutes (longer if possible) before serving. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Yield: 6 to 8 servings.

Advance preparation: This will keep for 3 or 4 days in the refrigerator. It’s best if you warm it up, either in a low oven or in the microwave.

Nutritional information per serving (6 servings): 306 calories; 8 grams fat; 4 grams saturated fat; 1 gram polyunsaturated fat; 2 grams monounsaturated fat; 105 milligrams cholesterol; 50 grams carbohydrates; 4 grams dietary fiber; 149 milligrams sodium (does not include salt to taste); 12 grams protein

Nutritional information per serving (8 servings): 229 calories; 6 grams fat; 3 grams saturated fat; 1 gram polyunsaturated fat; 2 grams monounsaturated fat; 79 milligrams cholesterol; 37 grams carbohydrates; 3 grams dietary fiber; 112 milligrams sodium (does not include salt to taste); 9 grams protein

Martha Rose Shulman is the author of “The Very Best of Recipes for Health.”

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