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You probably don’t think twice about your lights coming on when you flip on the switch. That could change as a result of legislation being pushed by the Citizens Utility Board (CUB).

The CUB-backed legislation would overrule a decision made by the experts at the Illinois Commerce Commission (ICC), who have determined that competition is the future of Illinois’ electric industry.

Instead of supporting the experts and welcoming competition, the legislation CUB advocates could jeopardize electric reliability by extending the current rate freeze. This would force electric utilities to pay more to buy power than they could charge consumers. As a result, utilities would be unable to recover their costs.

Everyone understands that would be an unsustainable business practice. The utilities would immediately begin losing money and would likely be unable to invest billions of dollars in the electric grid as they’ve done in previous years. Obviously, a company losing millions of dollars a day cannot afford to invest in reliability.

Experts say Illinois could experience a serious energy crisis if the ICC is not allowed to set sound long-term policies that will ensure low-cost, reliable electricity for consumers. Let’s not let that happen in Illinois.