SCRANTON — Jermyn resident Jordan Moran and six other community members urged the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission to reject a proposed rate hike from PPL Electric Utilities that would raise the average residential bill by roughly 7%.
During a public hearing Monday at the University of Scranton’s Brennan Hall, elected officials also voiced opposition to PPL’s proposal.
Moran, 29, a full-time student at Lackawanna College, who also works a full-time job, expressed frustration and concern.
“You’re constantly told to budget better and spend less on luxuries, while these billion-dollar corporations see record profits year after year,” he said. “I make about triple the Pennsylvania minimum wage and I still freeze in my house. My thermostat is at 60 degrees, and my PPL bill is still nearly 20% of my monthly income. We’re all living on the edge already in the fading middle class, how much more blood do you want to squeeze from us? I don’t have kids, and I can’t even think about starting a family in this economy, even though I’m nearly 30 years old.”
PPL Electric Utilities, which provides electricity to about 1.5 million customers in 29 counties in eastern and central Pennsylvania, in September filed notice of its intention to hike its rates, effective Dec. 1, in an effort to generate an annual revenue increase of $356.3 million.
In October, the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission voted to suspend and investigate the proposed rate increase. The move prompted the PUC to organize seven in-person and telephone hearings to gather public input.
Another hearing will be held Dec. 18 at 6 p.m. at Wilkes University’s Henry Student Center, 84 W. South St.
According to the PUC, the change would increase the total monthly bill for an average residential customer using 918 kilowatt-hours from $177.01 to $189.40. The total bill for a commercial customer receiving default service from PPL Electric Utilities and using 1,000 kilowatt-hours with a maximum demand of 3 kilowatts would increase from $161.74 to $170.34 per month, or by about 5.3%, the company said.
A final PUC decision on whether to adopt, reject or modify PPL’s rate increase request is due by July 1.
PPL officials stated the increase would help the company make necessary investments to build and maintain a stronger, smarter and more resilient electric grid to better withstand increasingly severe weather, prevent outages and improve service to customers.
“PPL Electric Utilities has been investing in our grid for the past decade, and we’ve worked really hard to hold our operating costs low,” said PPL Director of Communications Dana Burns. “Since last year, the improvements we’ve made for vegetation management, smart grid, a stronger grid, have reduced outages 30%. We still have work to do, and this rate request will allow us to do that.”
State Rep. Kyle Donahue, D-113, Scranton, described the proposed rate increase as “unreasonable, unacceptable, unethical and fundamentally unfair.”
“Just months after jacking up generation rates by 16%, PPL now wants another increase on the distribution side,” he said. “Families are rationing, skipping, cutting and praying the next bill won’t break them. Meanwhile, PPL proposed no increase for its LP5 (large commercial/industrial electricity users) rate class — the class that includes data centers — so seniors, small businesses and working families must foot the bill while massive, energy-consuming corporate users are shielded.”
Scranton Mayor Paige Gebhardt Cognetti also pleaded with the PUC to reject the rate hike.
“This is the fourth time, in less than two years, that I stand before the Public Utility Commission, alongside the families, seniors and small business owners who are doing everything they can to make ends meet,” she said. “Families cannot absorb any more utility rate increases — the cost of electricity, gas, water and sewer are climbing faster than the wages of the people who rely on these services. Across Scranton, seniors on fixed incomes are struggling to stay in their homes; and parents are making impossible choices between groceries, diapers, rent, prescriptions and keeping the lights on. We understand the utilities must maintain infrastructure, improve reliability and invest for the future, but those investments can’t come from the pockets of the most financially vulnerable people in their communities.”
State Rep. Jim Haddock, D-118, Pittston Twp., called on both PPL and the PUC to hold data centers accountable for their energy use.
“I’m respectfully asking PUC to outright reject PPL’s rate increase,” he said. “The actual filing is volumes, and within that is the devil in the detail. There is a category called LP-5 customers, and data centers fall into that group. They, in essence, are receiving a rate cut. It’s just simply unbelievable. With the tremendous amount of growth in Pennsylvania, and around the country from the data centers, we need a firm commitment from PPL that data centers pay their fair price and take the burden of their responsibility of the costs. We also need the PUC to require the data center pay their fair costs, not the people. The rate increase is totally out of line with the economic picture of Pennsylvania at the current time. It’s unjustified because it predominately rests on the back of those 1.3 million residential payers.”
Burns stated this rate request is on the distribution level, and is not related to data center customers.
“LP-5 customers are subject to transmission rates that are regulated through a separate process,” she said. “Data center customers paid for all the transmission upgrades meant to serve their business directly, and they do share in a portion of the transmission costs that are meant to serve everyone.”
PPL Electric is also proposing new large-load tariff provisions to protect customers from data center costs, officials said.
Burns added residential customers may actually see a decrease in their bills down the road as a result of data center growth.
“As this data center load ramps up, we predict transmission costs will reduce for all customers as those large-load users take on a greater share of those transmission system costs,” she said.
Burns urges customers struggling to pay their bill to reach out to PPL for support.
“We understand there are real affordability challenges right now, and we don’t take the timing of this request lightly,” she said. “We offer flexible ways to pay, energy savings tools and assistance programs.”
However, new homeowner Laura Doyle, 43, of Dunmore, stressed the continued rate increases place a growing burden on residents and need to be stopped.
“It’s been a struggle recently to keep my home in good repair, to pay rising food costs and keep up with my utilities,” she said. “I don’t want to have to choose between keeping the lights on and making sure I can afford food — no one should have to make that decision. This rate change will deeply impact low-income families in our community.”
