Surprise! Pacific Gas and Electric Quietly Raises Rates Again
In the beginning of 2008, it was big news that Pacific Gas and Electric was actually lowering rates by 1% on average. We sat down to crunch the numbers ourselves, and it was true. Lower tier users took a hit in their electrical costs, but it did average out to 1% over the major rate schedules. Unfortunately, it only took 3 months for PG&E to change their mind in favor of a rate hike. Surprise! Not one major newspaper has run an article on this - You heard it here first!
Towards the end of February, we discovered that Pacific Gas and Electric’s profits were up 34%! And by the end of the month they had decided to raise rates once again.
What does this mean for residential customers?
| PG&E Residential Rate Changes | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tier 1 (baseline) | Tier 2 (101-130% of baseline) | Tier 3 (131-200% of baseline) | Tier 4 (201-300% of baseline) | Tier 5 (>300% of baseline) | Reported Average | |
| Percent Change | -0.035% | -0.023% | +2.445% | +3.435% | +3.762% | +1.015% |
The reported average should always be taken with a grain of salt. In our experience, most people looking at solar power were paying (on average) about $0.22 per kilowatt-hour (before the new rate hike), and we expect that to go up about 2.5% under the new rate schedule. Of course, many people spend more; and, those are the people that can't get their solar electric systems in fast enough.
Commercial Customers got off easy this time.
Commercial customers had a much smaller rate increase; but, their rates still went up.
| PG&E commercial Rate Changes | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Rate Shedule | A-1 | A-6 | A-10 |
| Percent Change (Reported) | +0.591% | +0.562% | +0.701% |
If history is any indicator, we can expect another rate hike of at least 3% in less than 6 months.
Source: Pacific Gas and Electric Company
March 5, 2008
