{"id":41438,"date":"2022-09-27T13:06:52","date_gmt":"2022-09-27T17:06:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/?p=41438"},"modified":"2022-09-27T13:07:06","modified_gmt":"2022-09-27T17:07:06","slug":"georgia-powers-combined-rate-increases-could-raise-your-power-bill-55-to-60-per-month","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/?p=41438","title":{"rendered":"Georgia Power’s combined rate increases could raise your power bill $55 to $60 per month"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A nearly 12% rate increase Georgia Power<\/a> is seeking is just one of four the utility will be requesting during the next three years, a staff lawyer for the state Public Service Commission (PSC) said Tuesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If the PSC approves all four, the average residential customer bill could soar by $55 to $60 a month, not just the $16.29 monthly increase in base rates the company is asking for, Preston Thomas, representing the commission\u2019s Public Interest Advocacy Staff, said on the opening day of hearings on the rate hike request.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cStaff have concern with all of these different requests for rate increases in such a short period of time and the impact it could have on consumers,\u201d Thomas told commissioners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The rate hike, which Georgia Power proposed in June, would take effect on Jan. 1. The increase is front-loaded, meaning $14.32 of the additional $16.29 would kick in immediately. The remaining $1.97 would become effective in 2024 and 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The increase is needed to strengthen the utility\u2019s electric grid, add more renewable energy to its power-generation portfolio and improve customer service, Chris Womack, Georgia\u2019s Power\u2019s chairman, president, and CEO testified Tuesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are seeking to establish rates for the next three years that will allow us to continue to provide clean, safe, and reliable energy this state depends on and to deliver the first-class service our customers expect and deserve,\u201d Womack said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The PSC is scheduled to vote on the increase in base rates in December. But commissioners won\u2019t get much of a respite before Georgia Power returns to seek additional increases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Womack said Tuesday the company expects to file a request in February for unrecovered fuel costs to account for the volatility of the energy market resulting from factors including rising natural gas prices and the impacts of the war in Ukraine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thomas said Georgia Power also will seek increases to cover the costs of bringing the two nuclear reactors the utility is building at Plant Vogtle into service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Together, the four increases would drive up the utility\u2019s costs by about $2.9 billion, not the approximately $1 billion Georgia Power is seeking in the current rate hike request, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHow can we look at the rate impact without looking at the total for the three-year period that the company is coming before the commission and asking for?\u201d Thomas asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Womack said there\u2019s no way at this point to ascertain what Georgia Power would need to request in February in fuel recovery costs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Commissioner Lauren \u201cBubba\u201d McDonald said the utility has nothing to gain from those costs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFuel costs are a pass-through,\u201d he said. \u201cThere\u2019s no profit to be made by the power company on fuel costs.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Womack also noted that the two new reactors at Plant Vogtle will bring Georgia Power customers decades of carbon-free electrical generation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThese are investments we need to make,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Womack said the utility decided to front-load the rate increase because doing so will save customers about $40 million over the three-year period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Georgia Power customers complained about impact the rate hike would have on low-income customers during a public-comment period at the start of Tuesday\u2019s hearing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI can afford the rate increase,\u201d said Michael Black of Decatur. \u201cI\u2019m here for the least of these.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The hearings will continue on Wednesday and possibly Thursday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n[mailerlite_form form_id=3]\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A nearly 12% rate increase Georgia Power is seeking is just one of four the utility will be requesting during the next three years, a staff lawyer for the state Public Service Commission (PSC) said Tuesday. If the PSC approves all four, the average residential customer bill could soar by $55 to $60 a month, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37475,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[8479,12168],"class_list":["post-41438","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-family","tag-georgia-power","tag-state","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41438","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=41438"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41438\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=41438"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=41438"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=41438"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}