Sioux Valley Energy Revenue and Competitors

Sioux Valley Energy is a member-owned, not-for-profit electric cooperative founded in the late 1930s to provide reliable central-station electric service at cost-based rates to customers within the confines of its state-assigned service territory. The Cooperative currently provides electricity to nearly 20,000 farms, homes and businesses in a seven-county area of eastern South Dakota and southwestern Minnesota. Counties served include (in South Dakota) Moody, Minnehaha, Lake, Brookings and eastern Kingsbury, and (in Minnesota) Rock and Pipestone. Sioux Valley Energy's headquarters is at the junction of highways 34 and old 77 approximately one mile east of Colman, SD. There are full-service district offices in Pipestone, MN and Brandon, SD. Through its wholly-owned subsidiary, Sioux Valley Wireless, the Cooperative also provides a high speed wireless Internet service. Our residential-class high speed wireless Internet service downloads data approximately 10-times faster than standard dial-up modem technology and requires no telephone line connections. Even faster connectivity is available for an additional charge. Service requires a SVW microwave antenna and other equipment at the subscriber's location which must be installed by SVW technicians. Information about all of the services available from Sioux Valley Energy and Sioux Valley Wireless is available by calling 1-800-234-1960 or on the Internet at www.siouxvalleyenergy.com. Where Does My Power Come From? Sioux Valley Energy purchases its energy from two wholesale electric suppliers- East River Electric Power Cooperative and L&O Power Cooperative. East River is located in Madison, S.D. supplying 2.2 billion-kilowatt hours of electricity to its service area. East River's 212 substations and 2,600 miles of transmission lines serve 41 counties in South Dakota and Minnesota. This includes the Sioux Valley service territory of Minnehaha, Lake, Moody, Brookings and eastern Kingsbury counties. L&O Power Cooperative operates 200 miles of power lines and 16 substations providing wholesale power to two Minnesota counties in Sioux Valley Energy's service territory-Rock and Pipestone. East River and L&O, however, don't "make" electricity. They buy it from Basin Electric Power Cooperative and Western Area Power Administration (WAPA). Basin is one of the nation's largest generation and transmission cooperatives. Basin's generation plants currently use lignite (brown coal), PRB coal and wind power. WAPA falls under the administration of the Department of Energy, and is managed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation. WAPA markets hydroelectric power from federal dams to a 15 state region, which includes South Dakota and part of Minnesota. Basin produces 65 percent of the electricity used by Sioux Valley Energy customers; the rest comes from Missouri River hydro plants marketed by WAPA.