As the energy landscape continues to shift around us, I'm happy to report that our cooperative renewed our long-term commitment to Central Iowa Power Cooperative (CIPCO) by signing a new wholesale power contract. Negotiations lasted several years until CIPCO and its member-owner electric cooperatives came to an agreement on the updated terms that provide a framework to integrate new technologies and serve as a foundation for critical long-term resource decisions while maintaining flexibility.
Although 2023 began amid a backdrop of economic uncertainty, persistent inflation, and ongoing supply-chain disruptions, the wholesale power markets somewhat calmed and CIPCO's financial results reflected a year of strong performance and competitive rates. CIPCO is proud to maintain competitive rates that, today, remain below rates charged to Pella Cooperative Electric Association more than 10 years ago.
As your representative on the CIPCO Board of Directors, I was involved in discussions around the challenges we expected to come from the Environmental Protection Agency's Greenhouse Gas Standards and Guidelines for Fossil Fuel-Fired Power Plants, released in April this year. As expected, this barrage of new EPA rules ignores our nation's ongoing electric reliability challenges and is the wrong approach at a critical time in our nation's energy future. Additionally, these rules push additional essential "always available" generating resources such as coal off the grid just as the nation is depending on electricity to power more of the U.S. economy.
On behalf of its member-owners, CIPCO stands united with its cooperative and industry peers to challenge detrimental regulations and advocate for sensible energy policies. Intermittent generation resources such as wind and solar are a valuable and growing portion of CIPCO's energy mix, but coal and natural gas generators are critical to preserve reliability, minimize emissions, and keep electricity rates at an affordable level for Pella Cooperative Electric Association and its member-owners.
Severe weather events underscored the need for a robust transmission system in 2023. On March 31, a widespread tornado outbreak swept through the eastern part of Iowa, causing 23 system outages and 47 damaged transmission structures for CIPCO. In August, CIPCO reached a new all-time peak demand of 673 MW during a period of sustained high temperatures. I'm pleased to report that CIPCO met all its generation requirements as requested by the Midwest Independent System Operator (MISO) and did not need to call on any of its member-owners to shed load.
Despite these events and others, CIPCO maintained an overall outage rate of 0.209 hours per customer, one of the best years of reliability in CIPCO's history. For 2023, Pella Cooperative Electric's was 2.08 hours per member. In 2023, both Standard & Poor's and Fitch Ratings maintained CIPCO's 'A' ratings which confirm CIPCO's financial strength.
CIPCO remains dedicated to sound financial practices that allow margins to be returned to its members in the form of patronage, a key component of the cooperative business model. In 2023, CIPCO returned patronage totaling $160,123 to Pella Cooperative Electric Association.
I can assure you that the CIPCO Board, member CEO's, and the CIPCO management team are focused on finding solutions that balance the reliable, affordable, and sustainable energy our members expect and deserve. No matter the complex issues before us, cooperative solutions are the answer.