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Texas Startup Letting Homeowners Buy Wholesale Power Gets Funding to Expand

Texas Startup Letting Homeowners Buy Wholesale Power Gets Funding to Expand

(Bloomberg) -- Power giant Electricite de France SA took an equity stake in Griddy Energy LLC, a Texas-based supplier that lets homeowners buy electricity at real-time wholesale prices.

The investment from EDF will allow Griddy to expand beyond Texas into New York and the grid stretching across 13 states from New Jersey to Illinois, Chief Executive Officer Greg Craig said in an interview. The company did not disclose the size of EDF’s stake.

Instead of buying power at set retail rates from a conventional utility, Griddy gives homeowners and businesses direct access to the ups and downs of wholesale prices. There are no markups, but customers pay a $9.99 monthly fee. The company’s system includes an app letting customers see prices and, say, turn down the air conditioning when they spike.

Griddy says its customers pay an average 8.8 cents per kilowatt-hour, compared to the Texas average of 11.5 cents.

To contact the reporters on this story: Gerald Porter Jr. in New York at gporter30@bloomberg.net;Christopher Martin in New York at cmartin11@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Lynn Doan at ldoan6@bloomberg.net, Joe Ryan, Will Wade

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