Basin Electric directors return $43 million to members

At their November meeting, Basin Electric directors authorized the retirement of approximately $43 million in patronage capital.

Each year Basin Electric strives to retire about 1/30^th of its total undistributed patronage capital as of the end of the prior year. This distribution represents patronage capital associated with business done in 2008.

“Over the course of just the past five years, the Basin Electric board has approved the distribution of over $190 million in patronage capital,” said Katrina Wald, Basin Electric vice president and interim chief financial officer. “One of the benefits of being a member of a cooperative is that members own their cooperative, and therefore are entitled to the retirement of previously allocated margins that are undistributed. We assign all operating and non-operating before-tax margins to our members on a patronage basis, and the board at its discretion may decide when to retire those margins that were allocated in prior years.”

This action brings the amount returned to members since the year 2000 to over $840 million via patronage capital retirements and bill credits.

Wald said members will receive an official notice of their share of the patronage capital retirement, which is determined based on their power purchases during 2008, the year the patronage was originally allocated. The patronage capital retirements will be distributed in early December.