ROCHESTER, N.Y., Dec. 4, 2000 — eBidenergy.com, a facilitator of online energy procurement, data acquisition, and data analysis for U.S.-based commercial and industrial businesses, announced today it has signed an agreement with Aquila Energy that will expand the geographic regions both web-based companies can offer their commercial and industrial customers.

After going live in September 2000, eBidenergy.com has begun building a network of suppliers in New York and throughout the Northeast region of the United States. Aquila Energy, a Kansas City, Mo.- based company that is wholly-owned subsidiary of UtiliCorp United (NYSE:UCU), recently established YourEnergySource.com (YES), an auction commodity procurement Internet site with a supplier base in the Southwest and western United States. Under the agreement, eBidenergy.com and Aquila will hand off customers to each other when geographic boundaries limit their own services.

"The deregulation of energy markets across the United States has opened the door to competition in a once monopolized marketplace," said Terry Sick, the founder, president, and CEO of eBidenergy.com. "Our alliance with YourEnergySource/Aquila Energy will enable our customers to reach suppliers beyond our current geographic network, while still benefiting from the services we provide them."

eBidenergy.com and YourEnergySource will provide data hosting and procurement services to commercial and industrial businesses. These services will allow them to easily and efficiently take control of their energy costs, while at the same time efficiently manage their energy purchasing requirements. Using a series of online secure interfaces, customers can define multiple utility rate structures; view past and current billing; analyze the consumption patterns and trends of various utility types on a hierarchical basis down to the device level; compare energy consumption against multiple time periods; investigate rate structure models that best benefit individual consumption patterns; and calculate demand and usage for aggregated groups.

The bid feature accepts commodity purchase requests for proposals to solicit real-time pricing from electric and natural gas suppliers throughout the country.

"This agreement is another step forward in our effort to provide a nationwide e-commence marketplace for energy users and suppliers," said Don Greenwell, president, YourEnergySource. "The Internet is not only the answer to speeding up the energy transaction process, but it also offers the promise of greater savings in the cost of energy."

Aquila Energy is one of the top wholesale energy marketers in North America and is a leading manager of energy risk. It is a wholly-owed subsidiary of Kansas City, Mo.,-based UtiliCorp United, a multinational energy company with approximately four million customers. It operates in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Spain, Germany, Norway, New Zealand and Australia. At September 30, 2000, UtiliCorp had $10.0 billion in assets and 12-month sales of $23.0 billion.

eBidenergy.com utilizes a hosting facility with full 24/7 DBA support to ensure that the integrity, security, and accessibility of customer hosting and auction data. A high-speed, dedicated server tied to the Internet through redundant connections provides peace of mind through 100-percent uptime for every automated metering customer. eBidenergy.com supports Square D PowerLogic, MV90, and MTC Webfoot data collection systems.

For additional information, www.eBidenergy.com.