20230518AVU to Staff 4 Attachment 2.pdf

Staff_PR_004 Attachment 2 Page 1 of 2

Avista Corporation

Depreciation Study Data Questions – Follow Up

GENERAL:

1) Refer to question and response from previous set of data questions below:
“Why was there no gross salvage or cost of removal (COR) recorded for the 392 and 396
accounts across any of the functions? Do you have a new practice in place? We did notice that there
was a large outstanding balance sitting in 108000 for Vehicle Removal projects in 2021. We unitized
that project in 2021 and that moved the dollars from 108000 to 108001. At that point this is when cost
of removal and salvage would have been recognized. That amount was about $4.5 million.”

Follow Up:
What were the accounts/subaccounts for the $4.5 million that was moved to 108001 in 2021? See the
Transportation Cost of Removal spreadsheet attached.

ELECTRIC:

Account 370 Meters

2) Refer to the question and response from previous set of data questions below:
“Is the plan to continue to add the standard meters in the Washington district as well as the new
AMI meters? We have a few locations that did not convert to AMI meters but it is not very much. Is
there a plan to eventually shift to only adding AMI meters in Washington? I believe that is the plan”

Follow Up:
Is there a specific plan/timeline on the AMI meters program in Washington? Is there a year when Avista
will shift to only adding AMI meters in Washington? See the response below from our AMI Operations
Manager
Hi Jason,

We pretty much achieved switching only to AMI meters for WA in 2021, with a few exceptions.

There were a number (roughly 20,000) meters in gas only areas that were switched to mobile read
meters. This would be approximately 5 percent of the total meters. These are in areas where we do not
have the electric infrastructure in place to install the routing equipment.

Staff_PR_004 Attachment 2 Page 2 of 2

We still have MV90 meters and a couple other meter types with small volumes that we are not able to
convert at this time. And the opt out numbers are roughly 3,700 meters.

We can get you the exact break down if you would like.

GAS:
Account 376 Mains

3) Refer to the question and response from previous set of data questions below:
“Why are the cost of removal amounts for years 2017-2020 so low compared to years prior? We
haven’t been unitizing a lot of gas projects so the Cost of Removal is most likely sitting in RWIP. It would
become Cost of Removal once we unitize the project. That’s just how our system works.”
Follow Up:
Is it possible to get the amounts of cost of removal and gross salvage for this account as well as Account
380 that are currently sitting in RWIP? This looks to be as far as I can go into getting a breakout for
RWIP. I tried running a query with the utility account but it returned blank. I didn’t think RWIP got
associated with a utility account until it becomes cost of removal.