Solar proponents claim that electric rates in California have been going up significantly faster than inflation, making solar a good deal. Here’s the data to prove it.
http://www.energy.ca.gov/electricity/weighted_avg_retail_prices.html
Utility-Wide Weighted Average Retail Electricity Prices 1980-2005
(nominal $) (cents/kWh)
Year PG&E SCE SDG&E LADWP SMUD BGP ESPs Other Municipal Utilities Historical 1980 4.76 6.09 8.43 5.61 2.53 6.72 1981 6.05 6.45 9.36 6.16 2.82 6.48 1982 6.24 7.37 11.26 6.11 3.03 7.60 1983 6.42 7.42 11.66 5.85 3.75 7.48 1984 7.86 7.64 11.80 6.08 3.92 7.79 1985 8.73 7.94 12.84 6.54 4.56 7.81 1986 8.72 8.20 11.66 6.74 5.45 7.65 1987 7.56 8.19 10.42 7.09 6.64 8.22 1988 7.85 8.51 9.82 7.57 7.35 9.05 1989 8.79 9.17 9.51 8.06 7.41 9.50 1990 9.24 9.45 9.22 8.39 8.27 9.82 1991 9.87 10.07 9.36 8.23 8.30 9.91 1992 10.42 10.36 9.47 8.62 8.21 10.34 1993 10.59 10.06 9.89 9.13 7.69 10.96 1994 10.71 10.28 9.69 9.53 7.96 11.49 1995 9.89 10.46 9.67 9.14 8.18 11.43 1996 10.20 10.22 10.36 9.12 8.14 11.36 1997 10.30 10.22 10.70 9.36 7.92 10.51 1998 9.74 10.10 10.16 9.76 7.63 10.95 1999 9.81 10.05 10.16 9.75 7.60 10.96 2000 9.82 10.12 13.72 9.79 7.61 10.97 2001 11.74 12.87 13.66 9.79 9.26 13.57 2002 12.72 12.82 14.45 9.80 9.27 12.72 2003 13.18 13.16 14.26 9.80 9.81 12.43 2004 12.72 12.18 14.55 9.66 8.60 11.88 6.19 9.34 2005 13.07 12.93 14.72 9.31 10.10 11.97 6.44 9.51
Note: Energy Commission staff estimated these prices using data from EIA, utility websites and submittals during the IEPR cycles.
Utility-Wide Prices - These include prices for residential, commercial, industrial and agricultural customer classes.
BGP - This category includes electricity rates for customers of the cities of Burbank, Glendale and Pasadena.
Other Municipal Utilities - This category includes rates for Redding Electric Utility, Silicon Valley Power, City of Anaheim, Riverside, Roseville, Modesto Irrigation District, Turlock Irrigation District, and Imperial Irrigation District.
ESPs - These rates only reflect the generation portion of the total rate. Other charges such as T&D must be added. ESPs - Energy Service Providers include Arizona Power Service (APS), Constellation New Energy (CNE), Pilot Power Group, Strategic Energy LLC, and Sempra Energy Solutions.
http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/table5_6_a.html
Table 5.6.A. Average Retail Price of Electricity to Ultimate Customers by End-Use Sector, by State, November 2007 and 2006 (Cents per kilowatthour)
Residential Commercial Industrial1 Transportation All Sectors California Nov-07 Nov-06 Nov-07 Nov-06 Nov-07 Nov-06 Nov-07 Nov-06 Nov-07 Nov-06 California 14.26 14.47 11.94 12.23 9.75 9.66 7.8 7.27 12.23 12.38
http://www.neo.ne.gov/statshtml/115.htm
Average Revenue per Kilowatthour by State (Lowest to Highest Rate as of November 2007) Rank State Average Electricity Rate for All Sectors (Cents per Kilowatthour) 39 Maryland 11.58 40 District of Columbia 11.99 41 Vermont 12.11 42 California 12.23 43 New Jersey 12.84 44 Alaska 13.12 45 Rhode Island 13.55 46 Maine 13.66 47 New Hampshire 13.68 48 Massachusetts 14.71 49 New York 14.90 50 Connecticut 15.77 51 Hawaii 23.67
More info http://www.energy.ca.gov/electricity/index.html#rates
August 17th, 2008 at 10:13 am
Is the chart depicting increases in rates from 1980-2005 stated in 2005 Dollars?
Thank you
August 17th, 2008 at 3:37 pm
I think it’s in actual dollars, not adjusted.
September 1st, 2008 at 1:23 pm
Thanks for this.
If I do the math, it looks like the average annual increase is only in the range of 3%. If these are nominal dollars, this is actually somewhat less than the CPI rate of increase over the same period (just under 4%). Here’s what I get:
PG&E: 4%
SCE: 3%
SDG&E: 3%
LADWP: 2%
SMUD: 6%
BGP: 2%
Am I missing something? I typically get quoted an historical increase in the range of 5-6%/year.
September 3rd, 2008 at 1:15 pm
Yeah, it bothers me that the chart I had been given by my solar company to show customers said in big letters how electric rates had been climbing 6.7% a year for the last 25 years. The numbers shown here are lower. PG&E, the largest, most relevant utility to my location, at about 4.5%, not 6.7%. :-(
October 21st, 2008 at 1:12 pm
Looks to me like this is only KWh charges–which can include various taxes, tariffs, etc…but it doesn’t average in Demand Charges which can probably skew results.
November 24th, 2008 at 1:37 pm
The links for the Utility-Wide Weighted Average Retail Electricity Prices 1980-2005 table are dead. I checked the CEC’s website and they are not posted. Do you still have the original source data for this table?
November 24th, 2008 at 1:40 pm
Sorry, no I don’t have the data…. but I see that Archive.org does. Check it out
November 24th, 2008 at 7:11 pm
The EIA has a huge data set that can be filtered down to a very granular level (ie: Investor owned utilities like PGE vs Municipal owned like LADWP; commercial vs residential, etc). It’s likely that the data used by your solar company was different than the one shown here. It doesn’t make it wrong or incorrect, just not an apples:apples comparison.
Also, the CAGR calculation is highly sensitive to the length of time and period examined. Most solar companies include the 1970’s in performing their calculation. This tends to increase CAGR. This is not an unreasonable approach since PV systems have an expected life of >30yrs.