Utilities continue their mysterious seven-veil dance. This time it’s neither Enron gyrating in front of Congressional committees, nor Qwest dancing around deceptive billing practices.

In what must seem to Oregon consumers as yet another layer of obscurity, Pacific Power’s recently mailed brochure about new choices for Oregon consumers is causing confusion and anger over how these options are being displayed. Pacific Power’s Web site is more of the same.

The choices are nicely laid out at the top of the page. The enrollment fields follow. Then inconspicuously at the bottom left side is a link to ”other considerations.” Though these other considerations would easily fit on the same page as the energy options, they require the consumer to delve one layer deeper.

At the outset of Oregon’s new energy choices, it seemed as though Consumers would ultimately benefit from this new arrangement. For the first time, consumers could choose completely renewable resources, or simply continue their basic service.

But consumers are finding their choices confusing and are pointing to misleading information in Pacific Powers’ brochure.

”My problem is that they don’t really tell you what the rates really are,” said Gail Dubisar, a bookkeeper for a family farm business in Culver. ”I was hoping to at least compare the rates … and see if there was a cost savings in any options.”

Dubisar, like many others, was looking for ways to cut her 3300 kWh electricity bill. She considered changing to Pacific Power’s time-of-use option, which offers reduced energy rates for off-peak hours but higher rates for peak and mid-peak hours. She compared her current basic rates with the energy cost of the time-of-use plan and found it to be a potential savings. But before she signed on to the plan on the enrollment form, her eyes caught something at the bottom. ”If you look down there in the fine print, it says ‘other considerations.’ ”

As it turns out, ”other considerations” are charges for transmission, delivery, taxes that are lumped together on current utility bills. Confused and angry, Dubisar called Pacific Power. ”They said, ‘Oh yes, people are calling with that problem and it seems to have been an error of judgment on our part.’ ”

Deston Nokes, a company spokesman for Pacific Power said, ”Some of the charges were put in small print or off to the side. Given that none of us have done this before, I thought we’d get feedback on what was and wasn’t working for them.”

In fact, Pacific Power had just finished a similar project to offer consumers and small businesses in Klamath Falls renewable energy.

Dennis Martin, an AARP advocacy volunteer, also had reservations about the information on the brochure. ”We looked at the time-of-use closely because it might be good for some of our members,” he said ”We made some suggestions and were concerned about (the energy cost line). Not being able to compare makes it difficult for some people.”

Martin was also a member of a portfolio advisory committee, which made recommendations to the utility companies after the state Senate passed the bill that ensured these options for consumers.

”If Oregon consumers find it confusing and find that they’re not able to comparison shop, we want to know about it,” said Jan Margosian, in the financial fraud and consumer protections section of the Oregon attorney general’s office.

Pacific Power isn’t waiting for the attorney general’s call. It is working on a second information packet that would reiterate consumers’ options, in a clearer way. ”The suggestions have been for the next go-around to more clearly show what people would pay without then having to use a calculator. Some people want it more detailed and some want it less. We’re definitely going to be sitting down in the next few months and asking how we improve on that,” Nokes said.

Jack Breen, program manager of electric rates and planning at the Oregon Public Utility Commission has worked closely on the consumer protection side of the regulated choices. ”I think that every one involved will make another effort to educate consumers. There will be an effort undertaken once we have feedback and reviewed the concerns to see if there are areas that could be improved,” he said.

Under Pacific’s fixed renewable option, which is fuel fossil energy with a fraction of renewable energy, a pie chart suggests that this fraction of renewable energy somehow makes the emissions from the dominant fossil fuel block disappear. To be clear, the options ”renewable usage” and ”habitat” are the only 100 percent non-pollutive choices offered. The other choices are predominantly coal burning.

These communications were crafted last summer, according to Jeff Bissonnette, organizing director of the Fair and Clean Energy Coalition, a consumer group that was expecting to contribute to the communications.

That is, Pacific Power had time to draft the brochures and test their impact on focus and consumer groups. But that’s not what happened, according to Bissonnette.

”We saw the materials two weeks before they went to the printers around Thanksgiving, which caught us by surprise,” he said. ”Our task was to sift through the information and provide some recommendations about what it should look like. We expected the utilities to come back and say this is what we’re looking at sending out. Pacific had done a very nice brochure in Klamath Falls and that’s what we were expecting. Then we stumbled on this and we said, oy oy oy.”

Pacific wasn’t willing to consider redesigning the brochure, with its print date nearing, according to Bissonnette. ”We realized we would have to do a lot of work in getting people to understand this.”

Under the new energy bill, the utilities are forced to offer consumers regulated choices, including green power. As the utility, Pacific Power’s role is to buy and deliver the power that consumers choose. In a sense, the company’s role is that of a catalog-order business, the structure through which customers’ orders are fulfilled. As such, it is difficult to imagine that Pacific would be adverse to offering green and blue sweaters to its consumers that have had only one choice this far.

Yet the public information about these choices has, in some cases, acted as a deterrent for some.

”Is it a scam? I don’t think so. While we are all for people getting all the information that they can, we do have a fear that people will drop it because it’s awfully wordy and awfully dense. But people have been taking the time and have been getting it,” said Bissonnette, whose company took a pre-emptive move by publishing their own pamphlet with the choices simplified. ”Are there better ways to present the information? We certainly think so.”