On Friday, veteran Providence Journal reporter Kathy Gregg tweeted:

Yikes. Now I understand why my RI neighbors have been so upset on community page. Just looked and my own RI energy electric bill went up 30%. PUC where are you?

A good question by Gregg and one that others have asked.  Where has the Rhode Island Public Utilities Commission been while Rhode Islander’s electric bills have risen inexorably?

In fact, the PUC has sounded the alarm about one of the biggest drivers of Rhode Island electric bills: renewable energy.

On ENERGY STORAGE NOW NOW NOW!  Renewable energy, which has been mandated by Rhode Island’s 2021 Act on Climate, does not work as an energy source for the electric grid absent a major, toxic and costly energy storage infrastructure.  From their testimony, the RI PUC does not appear to oppose such an infrastructure but they believe it should be added via a deliberative, prudent process.  Instead, though, eager, pro-green energy legislators – just get it built; we have to save the planet!!1!! – filed an energy storage mandate bill, H7811, now law, in 2024 to recklessly accelerate the addition of such an energy storage infrastructure.  In testimony on the bill, the PUC raised serious concerns about the “substantial” cost to ratepayers and tight timeframe of the bill’s mandates, saying in part,

the bill imposes a ratepayer-funded solicitation process, all without any disclosure of the likely substantial costs to be imposed upon the ratepayers.

Interestingly, by the way, no sponsors or supporters of H7811 offered cost projections on it.

On NET METERING.  Bill H7808, filed in 2024, proposed to expand Rhode Island’s already costly (to ratepayers, let us underscore) Net Metering program.  In written testimony RI PUC Administrator George notes that ratepayers are compelled to pay well above market rates for this power.  She also offers the eye-opening figure of $1,010,898,066 – the amount that Rhode Island ratepayers paid from 2014 to 2023) in “renewable energy program costs”.  She notes that this figure excludes the cost of annual Energy Efficiency programs.  She expresses the PUC’s support of the proposed transition to a “clean energy future” but cautions that the transition must be “financially sustainable”. (This bill died in committee.)

On SHIFTING OF CONNECTION COSTS TO RATEPAYERS.  In January, 2016, the RI PUC submitted written testimony against passage of H7006 (subsequently turned into a Budget Article) that

… would shift certain costs of connecting a renewable energy project (wind turbine or solar power array, for example) into the electric grid from the developer to the ratepayer…

Apologies; no direct link from the mists of time to the PUC’s testimony here. But one of the things that the PUC referenced in recommending against passage was the best interest of all ratepayers.

On DEEPWATER WIND.  And the granddaddy of them all: the RI PUC’s actions against Deepwater Wind as well as the adding of renewable energy sources to the electric grid due to the cost to ratepayers.  In 2008, the RI PUC refused to issue a ruling to

force National Grid to sign long-term contracts to buy electricity from renewable source

And in March of 2010, the PUC

rejected as too expensive a proposed power-purchase agreement between Deepwater Wind LLC and National Grid Plc

Both of those pro-ratepayer rulings by the RI PUC were tromped on by the General Assembly and the governor.  (Interesting legal analysis of the tromping here.) And thus began Rhode Island’s journey down the road of unnecessarily expensive … er, planet-saving power generation.

This list of instances where the PUC has flagged the high cost of renewable energy proposals is probably not comprehensive; they are only the ones that I came across in research for this recent energy report by the Rhode Island Center for Freedom and Prosperity.

In short, the PUC has been here all along, sounding the alarm about the impact on our electric bills of some of the renewable energy proposals that come before them.  But the commission is appointed, not elected.  They do not set policy nor do they get a (permanent) veto over the proposals that are brought before them, no matter how daft … er, ill-advised they may be.

Kathy Gregg’s reporting, especially on the State House, is one of the reasons I subscribe to the Providence Journal.  But her current beats do not include energy.  So it is understandable that, like most residents of the state, she is not fully conversant with the RI PUC’s feedback on energy proposals.

More importantly, Gregg has no obligation to be informed on it because she does not set government policy; energy or other.  But the General Assembly and the governor do set policy.

Where is the PUC on our electric bills?  A better question might be, where have the General Assembly and the governor been?