HOUSTON – When you check your next electricity bill, the cost of powering your home will be more expensive. In the deregulated world of Texas electricity, there are companies that sell us the power, and companies like CenterPoint Energy that own the lines that get the power to us. In the industry, they’re a Transmission and Distribution Utility, or TDU.
On your bill, there is a TDU charge that pays for that, and CenterPoint’s went up more than anywhere else. It is not a case of ‘price-gouging’, but a change in seasons instead.
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Like a lot of people, Brett Ashburn pays close attention to the cost of powering his Katy home.
“I was just kinda’ like, ‘Well, what’s going on?’ What’s the reason for it?” he says. “It” is his September electricity bill from GEXA Energy noting that CenterPoint increased it’s TDU rate by almost 40%.
After the May windstorm and Hurricane Beryl, that left millions without power, Ashburn thinks it seems like really bad timing to be raising prices, “I can afford that, thank God, but there’s probably a lot of people that might not be able to.”
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David Kinchen, from Houston-based, Energy Ogre, says there’s nothing underhanded about the increase, “As it becomes a higher charge and becomes a higher switch to winter rates, it’s definitely becoming more noticeable.”
He explains what’s going on, like this: Each of the transmission utilities, like CenterPoint, has a baseline budget they need for operations. In the summer months, when we use more electricity, they charge less to get the power to us. In the winter months, which starts September 1 on their calendar, when we use less electricity, they charge more, to equalize what they need for their baseline.
“They’re trying to allocate the same fixed costs over fewer kilowatt hours, because we’re using more energy in the summer time period. And then in March, they lower those rates, because it’s the same fixed cost over more kilowatt hours,” says Kinchen.
In a statement, CenterPoint adds that the company is committed to affordability, while noting that TDU rates have remained relatively flat over the last 10 years.
As for the larger increase, compared to other utilities, industry observers say CenterPoint generally has a larger area, more customers, and vulnerable infrastructure to keep in good working order.
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Publish date : 2024-09-09 20:22:00
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