The Oklahoma Corporation Commission voted 2-1 to approve a 3.55% rate increase for PSO customers.
While the increase’s estimated dollar amount isn’t clear, the new percentage is significantly less than the originally proposed 15%. The company filed the case in January and cited electric grid upgrades, vegetation management and energy generation as drivers.
PSO previously backed a settlement that would have slashed the residential rate increase to 1%. The agreement also had support from the Attorney General’s office, AARP and the Corporation Commission’s public utility division.
“We are concerned about the impacts of the commission’s decision and are calculating the effect on customer bills and evaluating our options,” PSO spokesperson Matt Rahn said.
Leslie Berger, press secretary for the Attorney General’s office, said the final order rejected the original settlement’s rate designs, “which means residential customers will see slightly higher impacts than under the settlement while industrial customers will see modestly lower impacts than under the settlement.”
Still, Berger said the final order will save customers nearly $23 million annually.
The Corporation Commission’s approval comes after a sweltering summer with soaring electricity bills. PSO customers formed a petition demanding more transparency from the company and fewer rate increases. As of Nov. 5, the Change.org petition has about 40,000 signatures.
During the meeting, regulators disagreed about the expansion of a cost-recovery mechanism. Commission Chair Kim David wanted to expand a rider, which is a line item separate from electricity use, allowing PSO to recover certain transmission costs.
But Commissioners Todd Hiett and Brian Bingman said they wanted new projects to undergo more scrutiny in a traditional rate case. That means PSO could come back to the commission with another request in the near future.
While Bingman and Hiett approved the order, David voted against it.
“There are a lot of great things about this order,” David said. “There's just some things I felt like we could do to not be punitive and to be supportive of PSO while protecting the ratepayers.”
OCC spokesperson Jack Damrill said the company still has to file more financial information before a dollar amount is confirmed. The number could be less than the $11 interim fee customers have paid since this summer.
The order also includes a large load tariff, which has separate rates, terms and conditions for customers like data centers. The tariff is intended to protect residential customers from paying higher rates or interconnection costs for energy-hungry buildings.
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