Wyoming’s largest electricity provider is proposing to raise rates – again.
Rocky Mountain Power filed the 14.7 percent request on Aug. 2 with the Wyoming Public Service Commission (WPSC), which is in charge of regulating public utilities. If approved, it’d amount to about $17 extra per month for the average customer.
The increase is to help cover the costs of two things: insurance that’s rising because of wildfire threats on electricity infrastructure, and the cost of new energy projects, like wind farms and transmission lines.
Dick Garlish, Rocky Mountain Power’s president, said those investments will pay off.
“It's a little bit like your water heater, right?” Garlish said. “Like when you need a new water heater and you buy one. You know that in the long term, you're going to get the benefit of a more reliable, more efficient water heater, which is going to save you money on your bills.”
The company specifically pointed to several energy projects in Wyoming: Rock Creek I and II, wind farms slated for Albany and Carbon counties, and Gateway South and Gateway West Segment D.1, high voltage transmission lines for moving electricity across the grid. Notably, the lack of power lines are one of the biggest obstacles to expanding clean energy.
Garlish pointed out that these projects will benefit customers across the region, so Wyomingites are only paying for their share, which is 15 percent.
He added that he knows this rate hike request is going to be a hard pill to swallow for some.
“It hits some of us harder than others,” Garlish said. “We're trying to work within what we have to do to keep the business going and collect the costs that we need to recover to provide the service to everyone and also be responsible and try to mitigate the impacts on all customers.”
Rocky Mountain Power has a program to help with payments. To see if you qualify click here.
This rate hike request comes after two other recent increases. Last year, the company proposed an almost 30 percent increase, which was met with fury by Wyomingites. The WPSC combed through the reasoning and calculations and ultimately landed on a roughly 8 percent increase, effective the first of this year. This spring, about a 12 percent rate hike was also requested. It was part of the annual energy cost adjustment, where the company trues up what it actually cost to provide power against what RMP already collected from customers. It can sometimes be an increase or a rebate. That was reflected on customers’ bills starting in July, but is still pending final approval from the WPSC.
All in all, Rocky Mountain Power customers are currently paying about $23 extra per month. Notably, Wyoming electricity bills still remain below the national average.
Garlish said increases are somewhat a sign of the times.
“There is a lot of upward pressure on rates across the region and across the western United States and we're trying to ride those pressures,” he said. “They include inflation, wildfire costs, increased demand for electricity and making investments to grow the system.”
He specified that these increases are just the company recouping its costs.
“It's not that I can just raise rates and increase profits,” Garlish said. “That's just not true.”
He said that their requests are highly vetted by the WPSC before approved or denied.
But Garlish added that recouping costs is getting trickier. Rocky Mountain Power and its parent company, PacifiCorp, serve six states, some of which have goals to move to “all renewables all the time, without any kind of dispatchable resource,” Garish said. “And then on the other end of the spectrum, all dispatchable resources all the time. The truth lies in the middle.”
Meaning a mix of renewables and dispatchable sources, like coal fired power. This is what Wyoming is currently aiming for in the state’s energy strategy.
If the rate hike is approved by state regulators, it would go into effect June 1, 2025. The company plans to hold several public meetings across the state in the coming months. The WPSC will deliberate the company’s request over the next 10 months.
