By Alex Reyes, founding editor · Published · Figures from data retrieved
A utility’s rate is not one price but a series of them: each time a charge changes, a new version of the plan takes effect. WattClear follows 94 plans back through their earlier versions in URDB, the earliest from 2006, and prices each at 1,000 kWh a month. The median plan now costs 31% more than under its first version on record, about 2.6% a year, and 4 of the 94 cost less.
Three kinds of change drive new versions. Base rates are reset in a rate case, where a regulator reviews what the utility spends and what it may earn. Fuel and purchased-power adjustments pass through what the utility pays for energy, and reset on a schedule as that cost moves. Riders add a charge for a single purpose, such as storm recovery, efficiency programmes or a new plant.
In states where households choose their supplier, the utility’s own plan carries a default supply price that is reset on its own schedule, sometimes several times a year. The guide to delivery and supply shows how much of a bill each half is.
The median plan here gets a new version about every 1.6 years. Of 565 changes, 31% took effect in January, 3.1 times as many as in April, the next busiest month. Many utilities time annual adjustments and new base rates to the start of the year, and the filings show it.
| Month | Changes | Share |
|---|---|---|
| January | 177 | 31% |
| February | 33 | 6% |
| March | 45 | 8% |
| April | 58 | 10% |
| May | 45 | 8% |
| June | 55 | 10% |
| July | 48 | 8% |
| August | 21 | 4% |
| September | 27 | 5% |
| October | 27 | 5% |
| November | 18 | 3% |
| December | 11 | 2% |
The median change was 6.2% or more in 2022, 2023 and 2025, against no more than 2.4% in each year from 2015 to 2021. A year here is when a version took effect, not when its cost arose, so a rise that began in one year’s fuel prices can reach bills in the next.
| Year | Changes | Median change | Share that raised the bill |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 29 | −0.5% | 38% |
| 2016 | 45 | +1.7% | 58% |
| 2017 | 58 | +0.6% | 53% |
| 2018 | 55 | +2.4% | 64% |
| 2019 | 67 | −0.4% | 37% |
| 2020 | 16 | 0.0% | 19% |
| 2021 | 20 | +1.3% | 55% |
| 2022 | 46 | +10% | 85% |
| 2023 | 41 | +11% | 83% |
| 2024 | 66 | +4.8% | 67% |
| 2025 | 70 | +6.2% | 74% |
| 2026 | 42 | +4.7% | 69% |
| Utility | Plan | Since | Then | Now | A year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Consolidated Edison Co-NY IncNew York | SC-1 - Residential & Religious Service - Zone H [Westchester] | May 2016 | $169.12 | $346.63 | 8.5% |
| Central Maine Power CoMaine | A Residential Standard Offer Service (Bundled) | July 2017 | $144.27 | $287.07 | 8.4% |
| New York State Elec & Gas CorpNew York | WEST - SERVICE CLASSIFICATION NO. 1 - RESIDENTIAL SERVICE NSS | May 2017 | $109.62 | $193.70 | 7.5% |
| Potomac Electric Power Co | Residential - Schedule R | June 2017 | $115.07 | $194.41 | 6.6% |
| Rochester Gas & Electric CorpNew York | SERVICE CLASSIFICATION NO. 1 - RESIDENTIAL SERVICE RSS (Non-Retail Access Choice) | May 2017 | $123.68 | $198.52 | 6.1% |
| Duquesne Light CoPennsylvania | Residential Service | June 2017 | $152.74 | $237.27 | 5.5% |
| Portland General Electric CoOregon | Residential Service (Rate 7) | December 2013 | $112.43 | $207.46 | 5.2% |
| Pacific Gas & Electric CoCalifornia | E-1 -Residential Service Baseline Region P | December 2016 | $251.17 | $401.85 | 5.2% |
| Long Island Power AuthorityNew York | 180/183/186 (Residential Service) | January 2017 | $185.20 | $292.73 | 5.2% |
| NorthWestern EnergySouth Dakota | Rate 10: Residential Electric | November 2015 | $111.73 | $177.56 | 5.0% |
4 plans cost less now than under their first version on record: Public Service Co of NH’s Residential Service, 21% lower since February 2023; Horry Electric Coop Inc’s Residential Rate - Single Phase, 11% lower since October 2013; City of San Antonio, Texas (Utility Company)’s RE - Residential Service, 8.6% lower since August 2017; and Intermountain Rural Elec Assn’s Residential Service (A), 1.3% lower since February 2013.
Each utility page follows one plan it can quote — the standard offer where URDB marks one — back through URDB’s record of the version it replaced, and prices every version at 1,000 kWh a month with the same rate engine as the rest of the page, fixed charges included. A figure is that version’s own charges; where a supply or fuel charge is reset often, it is the charge as the record caught it.
A record that disagrees with the ones around it is left out rather than drawn as a price change: 56 versions in all. Some are corrected by a record with the same start date, some carry a mistyped rate that the next version puts right, and some cover only part of the bill, which shows as a price far from the state’s average that year. The methodology page sets out each rule, and every version on a utility page links to its URDB record.
Every figure here is computed when the site is built, from the records named below, by the same code that fills the state, utility and cost-to-run pages this guide links to. When those records are refreshed, the figures change with them; the words around them do not, which is why no sentence here states a direction the data has not been checked for.
The text was reviewed by the editor before publication. The methodology page sets out what the rate engine assumes and where its figures stop being reliable.