INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana regulators have slashed by 60% a request from Duke Energy to raise rates on 840,000 customers across the state.
The Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission ruled Monday that Duke Energy, the state’s largest electricity provider, could collect an additional $146 million a year from customers. That’s down sharply from Duke Energy’s original request of $395 million and its revised request of $362 million.
A Duke Energy spokeswoman said it would take several weeks to calculate new monthly rates, based on the approved revenue requirement. Under the utility’s original request, filed last summer, monthly household bills would have increased by an average of 15%.
The increase, after it is calculated, will be implemented in two phases: the first later this year, and the second next year.
Duke Energy had said it needed to raise rates to offset the costs of generating cleaner electricity, improving the reliability of electric service and making “investments to serve a growing customer base.”
“We know this is a challenging time for customers,” Stan Pinegar, president of Duke Energy Indiana, said in a written statement. “We have taken a number of steps as a company to help customers financially during this pandemic. We voluntarily suspended service disconnections for nonpayment, as well as a variety of customer charges, which continues today. We wanted customers to have peace of mind that their electric service would remain on at the height of the pandemic. We remain committed to working with customers who may be struggling financially.”
Duke Energy said the next step is to file for implementation of rates, and it will take about a month for that to be compiled and reviewed by state utility regulators.
The Office of Utility Consumer Counselor said it was still reviewing the IURC’s 175-page order and had no immediate comment.
For more on this story, see Tuesday’s Republic.
