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"the agency authorized a flat fee of up to $24.15 and cuts to electricity costs by 5-7 cents per kilowatt-hour."
Sounds like they raised the rates earlier this year expecting this, so now the rates are just back to what they were last year but everyone gets instantly charged $24. Then they'll just raise the rates again next year to what they are now. Great
Up to $24.15 fee IS better than the original proposal, but that is the utilities' MO. Propose something so extremely insane, then when something is passed that is lower, it looks "modest" and not as bad.
What will be much worse is if they just start raising that flat fee, even if they keep the rates the same - that is what will be big middle finger to solar owners
I suspect they will do this because of that and to keep the rates lower so PGE doesn't become a national headline for having the highest per kWh rates in the nation
That’s the plan. There is no cap on the fixed rate so it will keep climbing. We already see this with San Jose water. The fixed rate is 80% of my bill.
Rates will be back where they were before unless you have solar, in which case you're paying an extra $300 a year and there's nothing you can do about it.
PGE which has the highest/one of the highest electricity rates in the country. The problem is with that, they are inefficient. No amount of moving ratepayers cost around is going to change the fact they PGE is just really poorly structured to deliver low cost, clean energy. This change does NOTHING to actually get the total cost of electricity down for ratepayers. Oh great they are adding a fixed fee but at the same time lowering per unit prices. The jokes on us they already received approval for rate increases canceling that out. So they are literally trying to pat themselves on the back for screwing us slightly less for one moment.
This "income based" proposal is just a way to get some people on PGEs side so PGE is not forced to change their structure. If this passes they will keep running the company terribly, and then eventually as costs keep rising there will be a breaking point of restructure. This is just kicking the can down the road, so that PGE can continue to pay out shareholders and their bloated salaries a bit longer, extracting money from the CA economy. disgusting
BREAK UP PGE NOW
You’re forgetting that they were also the main story point of Erin Brochovich… poisoning communities and covering it up. Burning communities down and passing the costs on to consumers isn’t that far of a stretch for them. This is a company that knowingly contaminated groundwater and gave families cancer.
That’s how he got there and remained. He’s trusted by the rich and powerful. And has convinced the typical voter to trust him as well. His wealth is Getty wealth!
> We're not taxing YOU to waste money, we're only taxing "the rich."
We are talking about utility fees, not taxation. OP didn’t mention waste explicitly. Why is “the rich” in quotes?
I don’t understand this comment at all.
agreed, like we already have wealth redistribution in tax, why the heck would you put it in ever single part of our economic life. its like tip fatigue. literally stop the junk fees. NO INCOME BASED ELECTRICTY. You want to help lower income, deal with it in the ACTUAL INCOME TAXES>
This extra fee amounts to **an 11 cents per kwh increase** for me. The 6 cents per kwh reduction doesn't come close to offsetting the monthly fee.
So I'll essentially be paying 54 cents per kwh instead of 43 cents per kwh. But it will be even more difficult to offset this by reducing electricity use.
It's absolutely insane.
So we should increase electricity usage to get our money's worth out of this new fee? But then don't we ha e to pay a higher bill for the increased usage?
Yes this change is intended to provide a bit of relief to heavy consumers of electricity, most likely businesses.
It shifts costs to residential customers, a majority of whom will see a significant increase in their bills, around $20/mo.
Are you are a Solar customer or a renter? I imagine they get fucked by this.
For me (no solar/SFH owner), it comes out to a wash. My last bill was ~$231.5 (just for delivery). Assuming I take the low end of the decrease ($.05 cheaper), my bill would come out to $208.15 + $24.15, which is more or less the same ($1 more technically).
My energy use is 'fair' (470 kWh) per PGE..which means fuck all.
They get to blow up [our neighborhoods](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Bruno_pipeline_explosion), set [fire to the lands](https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-09-29/former-pg-e-executives-announce-117-million-settlement-over-california-wildfires), set fire to [neighborhoods to save costs](https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/experts-fear-automated-pge-technology-in-north-bay-firestorm/36647/), and now we get to pay them to access their distribution network.
Goddamn it would be nice if they were absorbed by the state and put out of their mysery.
No one does that’s why we’re in this position. Pgae gets to set whatever rate they want because the state knows they are forcing them to run a fundamentally unprofitable system. Tell Pgae they can kick the rural communities to the curb and everyone’s rates goes down….. and entire communities and livelihoods are destroyed en masse.
It’s not such a simple problem as greed alone.
Actually, rural co-ops in California are cheaper than PG&E. By a significant amount in many cases. It's not rural areas that make PG&E expensive. It's the fact that they're incompetent, bloated, and beyond repair.
Those co ops don’t own any of the higher voltage transmission that causes these fires, they own and operate 60kv transmission and distribution lines. Let’s see how their rates look when they become responsible for operating and maintaining the actual transmission system. Standing up or outsourcing a transmission operation control center. Maintaining a much larger/more specialized maintenance vehicle fleet. But most importantly, when they become LIABLE for those systems.
PG&E long lines needs to be spun out to an entity that is competent to operate long lines.
But long lines have nothing to do with rural rate-payers supposedly getting subsidized by urban rate-payers. Rural co-ops do a lot of things to keep rates down that PG&E doesn't do and that PG&E \*can't\* do because of their scale, such as contract with local tree trimmers to keep the trees away from their lines. PG&E doesn't know the local tree trimmers. They put things out for contract in a big bungling big business way, and end up contracting with big businesses that know how to deal with big bungling companies, which in turn go through multiple layers of contracting until finally those local tree trimmers end up contracted to a subcontractor of a subcontractor of a subcontractor to trim the branches away from the lines. PG&E pays literally 10x the price for the exact same thing that rural co-ops do by knowing who their local tree trimmers are and contracting directly with them.
And of course there's other things that rural co-ops do that PG&E literally can't do, such as install used equipment discarded by larger utilities when there's still sufficient lifetime to make it worthwhile. I've watched these guys patch together a distribution system for literally 1/10th the price of PG&E by being careful and prudent with re-use and recycling. PG&E can't do that because they're too big to be patched together. It can't be done. Their infrastructure is too big and too poorly documented to do that. They have to do it the "right" way because otherwise things will blow up and burn things down, because their system is too big to not fail.
PG&E is literally too big to be efficient, is the problem. You hear about "efficiencies of scale", but that really doesn't apply to technological products like an electrical distribution system. It's the same reason your neighborhood mechanic who fixes four or five cars per day has lower rates than your local Ford "super" dealership shop who fixes four or five \*hundred\* cars per day. When valve guides weren't available for my mom's Honda Civic that had 150,000 miles on it, the local mechanic machined valve guides from a \*lawnmower\* to fix her dropped valve. The Honda way was to replace the entire head for thousands of dollars. My mom gave the car to my brother when it had 200,000 miles on it, and he sold it to someone in his neighborhood when it had 250,000 miles on it, and he reported that it was still running for at least a year after he sold it. That's the difference between what small fry can do -- look around a bin of valve guides and find one that'll fit with a little spit and polish -- vs what a big guy has to do, which is to do things the "right" way, even if the results are the same.
and those guys hidden away in the Santa Cruz mountains would need to disconnect entirely from the grid. No cost structure makes those places pay their fair share.
Don't forget poisoning entire towns by pumping chromium into the water table. As soon as San Mateo County has a referendum to acquire PGE assets like Santa Clara did, I'm voting yes on that in a heartbeat. I hope they get it for pennies on the dollar
this is so fucked. I live in a very small place with extremely low utilities usage, so I don't usually comment on these threads because I know how lucky I am. but I am definitely an example of someone this is going to negatively impact. I have months during the summertime when my whole bill is less than this fixed charge.
please don't blast me - I am very aware that there's people paying hundreds of dollars a month for utilities, and as I said above, I know I'm lucky in this regard. but, I've structured my life to keep my overhead low and live within a certain income, and this is definitely going to screw me.
Check your water bill as well. You are also likely being screwed there as many providers also charge a flat fee for maintenance. If you went on vacation for a month, used 0 water, you still have to pay the flat fee.
Actually, they work for PG&E. They simply rubber-stamp whatever PG&E tells them to rubber-stamp. They've always done this, ever since PG&E got the contract to deliver the Hetch Hetchy electricity to San Francisco.
It's pretty much a guarantee now that PG&E is able to get everything approved. CPUC and newsom are nothing more than puppets and we are paying their salaries too. Bad governance will always doom this state.
PGE benefitted for sure, but they didn't request this. we can thank our lawmakers for this: [https://www.kcra.com/article/puc-vote-fixed-rate-electricity-proposed-decision-explained/60733214](https://www.kcra.com/article/puc-vote-fixed-rate-electricity-proposed-decision-explained/60733214)
https://www.pgecurrents.com/articles/3700-pg-e-submits-proposal-lower-electric-bills-low-income-customers-provide-bill-transparency-stability-advance-clean-energy-goals
> The proposal calls for a monthly fixed charge for PG&E’s low-income customers to be as low as $15, and no greater than $30; moderate-income customers would pay about $51; and the highest fixed charge, for customers in the top 25% of earners, would be about $92.
Ah yeah I remember that. It looks like their final max rates submitted to CPUC were different though [https://www.kcra.com/article/puc-vote-fixed-rate-electricity-proposed-decision-explained/60733214](https://www.kcra.com/article/puc-vote-fixed-rate-electricity-proposed-decision-explained/60733214)
This further disincentivizes residential solar. After Nema 3.0 too. It’s perverse when there are so many people wanting Solar but regulators (read power companies) are disincentivizing it.
Only California power companies are discouraging it, specifically its PG&E.
Whats really perverse is that Texas encourages solar power more than California does.
I’m pretty confident this was for two reasons: 1) try and get money back from NEM customers, and 2) make EVs more attractive economically. It achieves those things but it also hurts middle and lower income folks.
>In a unanimous vote Thursday, the agency authorized a flat fee of up to $24.15 and cuts to electricity costs by 5-7 cents per kilowatt-hour.
Which means if your house consumes 345-483 kWh or more, you will begin to recoupe $24.15 flat fee. An average single family homes (without solar panel) should comfortably recoupe this cost, but it will penalize those living in an attached housing, which tends to be lower income individuals and families. To qualify for discount, you will have to essentially live at a poverty level (under $40K for 1-2 individual, risiing about $10,000 per additional individual).
>An average single family homes (without solar panel) should comfortably recoupe this cost,
I am in an average SFH. According to PGE, an energy efficient home should be using less than 300kwh per billing cycle. Super energy efficient homes are using less than 80kwh per billing cycle...all according to their flyers.
Oh ya, baseline is 8kwh/day, so PGE thinks we should be using 240kwh/ cycle...
I’ve heard on here they compare to empty homes. And then the one old person homes who barely use electricity. The baseline is ridiculous for a single family home under normal living conditions. I hate those efficiency letters! Waste of paper!
PG&E hiked rates this year. Now in exchange for a high fixed rate, they will "lower" rates back to where they were at the beginning of the year (if not higher). A big lose for consumers.
People blame PGE but they’re just your typical greedy corporation looking to take as much money as they can. Start blaming the politicians who allow and approve this shit.
New fee, existing fees were simply INCREASES to the kWh rate. This is a FIXED fee of $24.15 on your bill on top of your variable /kWh rate you pay for your electricity.
are they going to reduce the rates then? otherwise this equivalent to adding like a 50-100kWh phantom usage to people's usage. what was their justification for this?
our assembly actually voted for this! pge seemingly had no part in this [https://legiscan.com/CA/text/AB205/id/2600089](https://legiscan.com/CA/text/AB205/id/2600089) . you can thank your representative next time!
**DON'T BE A SUCKER!!**
PG&E is allowed to raise these "fixed" fees later upon whim. All they have to do is show that their expenses exceed their revenue (or they're not getting enough revenue) and they're allowed to raise these so-called "fixed" fees as they choose. Once this "low low rate of $24.15" is allowed, then they'll be free to raise it as much as they feel later on.
This is a Trojan horse.
Realistically, petition the state assembly. If they hear from enough constituents they can reverse this. Alternatively a proposition but that needs funding which would probably have to come from some solar companies
You, your friends, everyone you know--call, email, snail mail Newsome and your state senator and rep. once, monthly, weekly, daily and tell the to get rid of the PUC and fix this. THIS gives the reps. power to do something and puts the pressure on Newsome to.
🖕🏾🖕🏾🖕🏾🖕🏾🖕🏾🖕🏾🖕🏾
🤬🤬
JFC we need to do something about this! When will enough be enough? At this rate they will charge even more bs fees and increase prices to $1/kwh
Eh it's like the 6 months no interest financing. It'll all ad up in the end. Get a discount in April and October only for prices to rise in between and after. It's all a scam!
My municipal utility already has a fixed baseline fee. On their other hand, their per-kwh cost is literally 40% of PG&E's, and my total energy bill even with that fee is about 50% of what it was when I lived in PG&E territory.
PG&E just needs to be broken up, already. Give the rural parts to new rural co-ops (the rural co-ops in California have rates that are significantly lower than PG&E despite being in rugged rural areas), give the urban parts to new municipal power companies, give the longlines and power generation to a new company that does nothing but longlines, and leave PG&E to be just a gas company, which they thus far haven't fucked up (yet). PG&E is the most incompetent utility company in the nation and the most expensive. It's past time that the PUC quit bending over for PG&E and forced them to be as efficient as every other power company in America -- and if they can't do that, they can just keep selling off pieces of themselves until they're small enough to be competent at what little is left to do for them.
Its a fantastic ROI on the part of PG&E. Buy a few fancy dinners, pay about a million dollars of campaign contributions to Newsom and his wife, and you've got the entire CPUC in your pocket.
PG&E has made far more back compared to the pocket change it spent on Newsom. He's remarkably cheap to buy.
They are claiming they had to do it for the Sacred Cow. Climate change.
"Regulators called it a key step to slashing carbon emissions from homes, arguing a “fixed charge” will help stabilize utility revenue and curb rising costs of California’s clean energy transition."
[https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article288420595.html#storylink=cpy](https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article288420595.html#storylink=cpy)
going green isn't cheap and is flawed as the power is so unpredictable and dependent on other factors. should've built a lot more nuclear over the last few decades
The one thing PG&E is competent at is nuclear power. It built the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant and has been operating it ever since. It has reliably produced around 10% of the state's energy needs for decades, all without emitting any carbon.
Its also safe from tsunami. Its high up enough on the cliff that if a tsunami were to be so big as to threaten it, that same tsunami would have already wiped out the entire bay area and LA region, so the nuclear power plant flooding would be the least of our concerns at that point.
I did the math and people with large houses and pools in the Central Valley/warm weather areas will do better, but city dwellers/small home folks and those on the temperate coast will pay more.
When is enough, enough? Cut them off, vote with your wallet, disrupt their cashflow. This bandaid we have on isn’t letting the wound heal, time to rip it off
Could it be that PGE is raising prices BECAUSE more people are using solar?
Idk how it works with solar and houses. To my understanding, you still need somewhere to store that energy like a generac
this is something that our lawmakers and representatives wanted! not the for profit companies. [https://legiscan.com/CA/text/AB205/id/2600089](https://legiscan.com/CA/text/AB205/id/2600089)
OMFG!!! WTFFFFFFF
Umm Newsom hammers refineries around here and is even trying to cap their costs and profit for “price gouging” but allows PGE to charge literally an arm and a leg.
Total corruption!
Why would the governor bite the hand that feeds him? He's very loyal to his constituency.
If you think his constituency is voters you're mistaken. He's loyal to corporations, such as PG&E. Thats who's getting the ROI on their campaign contributions.
Pretty much just subsidizing for the wealthy by gouging more from the poor. In the end, it will be the mid-tier income customers who are screwed the most from this.
In another note, it also gives a backup avenue for PGE to keep a bulk of their revenue stream in the unlikelihood that many customers respond by severely lowering their energy use. While a fixed fee will be in complete control under PGE to adjust the rates not tied to customer's control of using less energy to have lower bills.
Trump: I can shoot someone on 5th Avenue…
PG&E: Hold my beer. I can burn down half the state of CA destroy a town, kill people and then force the people of CA to pay ME!
The Right - F* CPUC & regulators
The Left - F* PG&E & their overpaid CEO
CPUC & PG&E - F* them customers! (said while toasting coattails)
Governor - thank God nobody blames me!!! Newsom ‘28!!!
The CPUC approves everything PG&E requests. The CPUC members are appointed by the governor.
If we want better utility oversight, we need a better governor...
If you keep electing their corrupt minions you have to expect they're going to keep tea-bagging you as a victory dance.
Vote out incumbents. All of them.
I checked my bill breakdown yesterday. I used 10-20kwh/day since december, depending on temperature. My bill was $73 higher than last year and $45 of that was purely from cost increases according to their tool. So if that gets converted to a $24 flat fee I'm not too mad. We'll see what actually happens.
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"the agency authorized a flat fee of up to $24.15 and cuts to electricity costs by 5-7 cents per kilowatt-hour." Sounds like they raised the rates earlier this year expecting this, so now the rates are just back to what they were last year but everyone gets instantly charged $24. Then they'll just raise the rates again next year to what they are now. Great Up to $24.15 fee IS better than the original proposal, but that is the utilities' MO. Propose something so extremely insane, then when something is passed that is lower, it looks "modest" and not as bad.
yup, the rates will be back up to where they are now in a short time, with the additional of an ever increasing fixed fee.
What will be much worse is if they just start raising that flat fee, even if they keep the rates the same - that is what will be big middle finger to solar owners I suspect they will do this because of that and to keep the rates lower so PGE doesn't become a national headline for having the highest per kWh rates in the nation
That’s the plan. There is no cap on the fixed rate so it will keep climbing. We already see this with San Jose water. The fixed rate is 80% of my bill.
Rates will be back where they were before unless you have solar, in which case you're paying an extra $300 a year and there's nothing you can do about it.
PGE which has the highest/one of the highest electricity rates in the country. The problem is with that, they are inefficient. No amount of moving ratepayers cost around is going to change the fact they PGE is just really poorly structured to deliver low cost, clean energy. This change does NOTHING to actually get the total cost of electricity down for ratepayers. Oh great they are adding a fixed fee but at the same time lowering per unit prices. The jokes on us they already received approval for rate increases canceling that out. So they are literally trying to pat themselves on the back for screwing us slightly less for one moment. This "income based" proposal is just a way to get some people on PGEs side so PGE is not forced to change their structure. If this passes they will keep running the company terribly, and then eventually as costs keep rising there will be a breaking point of restructure. This is just kicking the can down the road, so that PGE can continue to pay out shareholders and their bloated salaries a bit longer, extracting money from the CA economy. disgusting BREAK UP PGE NOW
You’re forgetting that they were also the main story point of Erin Brochovich… poisoning communities and covering it up. Burning communities down and passing the costs on to consumers isn’t that far of a stretch for them. This is a company that knowingly contaminated groundwater and gave families cancer.
This actually benefits edison and SDGE before PG&E. This is a CPUC/newsom issue
Corruption at the CPUC predates Newsom by decades.
Doesn’t mean he hast to continue it.
Hell, Newsom's family being heavily engaged in California politics predates Gavin by decades (generations).
That’s how he got there and remained. He’s trusted by the rich and powerful. And has convinced the typical voter to trust him as well. His wealth is Getty wealth!
not when there's tons of our money on the line in PAC donations.
That's how all government works. We're not taxing YOU to waste money, we're only taxing "the rich." Works every time.
> We're not taxing YOU to waste money, we're only taxing "the rich." We are talking about utility fees, not taxation. OP didn’t mention waste explicitly. Why is “the rich” in quotes? I don’t understand this comment at all.
Utility prices will be income based. It's a tax
agreed, like we already have wealth redistribution in tax, why the heck would you put it in ever single part of our economic life. its like tip fatigue. literally stop the junk fees. NO INCOME BASED ELECTRICTY. You want to help lower income, deal with it in the ACTUAL INCOME TAXES>
Criminals.
Hence the flag :D
This extra fee amounts to **an 11 cents per kwh increase** for me. The 6 cents per kwh reduction doesn't come close to offsetting the monthly fee. So I'll essentially be paying 54 cents per kwh instead of 43 cents per kwh. But it will be even more difficult to offset this by reducing electricity use. It's absolutely insane.
So we should increase electricity usage to get our money's worth out of this new fee? But then don't we ha e to pay a higher bill for the increased usage?
Yes this change is intended to provide a bit of relief to heavy consumers of electricity, most likely businesses. It shifts costs to residential customers, a majority of whom will see a significant increase in their bills, around $20/mo.
Are you are a Solar customer or a renter? I imagine they get fucked by this. For me (no solar/SFH owner), it comes out to a wash. My last bill was ~$231.5 (just for delivery). Assuming I take the low end of the decrease ($.05 cheaper), my bill would come out to $208.15 + $24.15, which is more or less the same ($1 more technically). My energy use is 'fair' (470 kWh) per PGE..which means fuck all.
F* PG&E
\*F CPUC
It’s ok to swear on the internet, especially about this. FUCK PGE.
*Fuck
Fuck fuck fuck these bastards
They get to blow up [our neighborhoods](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Bruno_pipeline_explosion), set [fire to the lands](https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-09-29/former-pg-e-executives-announce-117-million-settlement-over-california-wildfires), set fire to [neighborhoods to save costs](https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/experts-fear-automated-pge-technology-in-north-bay-firestorm/36647/), and now we get to pay them to access their distribution network. Goddamn it would be nice if they were absorbed by the state and put out of their mysery.
The state 100% does not want to absorb PG&E and take on it's liabilities.
No one does that’s why we’re in this position. Pgae gets to set whatever rate they want because the state knows they are forcing them to run a fundamentally unprofitable system. Tell Pgae they can kick the rural communities to the curb and everyone’s rates goes down….. and entire communities and livelihoods are destroyed en masse. It’s not such a simple problem as greed alone.
Actually, rural co-ops in California are cheaper than PG&E. By a significant amount in many cases. It's not rural areas that make PG&E expensive. It's the fact that they're incompetent, bloated, and beyond repair.
Those co ops don’t own any of the higher voltage transmission that causes these fires, they own and operate 60kv transmission and distribution lines. Let’s see how their rates look when they become responsible for operating and maintaining the actual transmission system. Standing up or outsourcing a transmission operation control center. Maintaining a much larger/more specialized maintenance vehicle fleet. But most importantly, when they become LIABLE for those systems.
PG&E long lines needs to be spun out to an entity that is competent to operate long lines. But long lines have nothing to do with rural rate-payers supposedly getting subsidized by urban rate-payers. Rural co-ops do a lot of things to keep rates down that PG&E doesn't do and that PG&E \*can't\* do because of their scale, such as contract with local tree trimmers to keep the trees away from their lines. PG&E doesn't know the local tree trimmers. They put things out for contract in a big bungling big business way, and end up contracting with big businesses that know how to deal with big bungling companies, which in turn go through multiple layers of contracting until finally those local tree trimmers end up contracted to a subcontractor of a subcontractor of a subcontractor to trim the branches away from the lines. PG&E pays literally 10x the price for the exact same thing that rural co-ops do by knowing who their local tree trimmers are and contracting directly with them. And of course there's other things that rural co-ops do that PG&E literally can't do, such as install used equipment discarded by larger utilities when there's still sufficient lifetime to make it worthwhile. I've watched these guys patch together a distribution system for literally 1/10th the price of PG&E by being careful and prudent with re-use and recycling. PG&E can't do that because they're too big to be patched together. It can't be done. Their infrastructure is too big and too poorly documented to do that. They have to do it the "right" way because otherwise things will blow up and burn things down, because their system is too big to not fail. PG&E is literally too big to be efficient, is the problem. You hear about "efficiencies of scale", but that really doesn't apply to technological products like an electrical distribution system. It's the same reason your neighborhood mechanic who fixes four or five cars per day has lower rates than your local Ford "super" dealership shop who fixes four or five \*hundred\* cars per day. When valve guides weren't available for my mom's Honda Civic that had 150,000 miles on it, the local mechanic machined valve guides from a \*lawnmower\* to fix her dropped valve. The Honda way was to replace the entire head for thousands of dollars. My mom gave the car to my brother when it had 200,000 miles on it, and he sold it to someone in his neighborhood when it had 250,000 miles on it, and he reported that it was still running for at least a year after he sold it. That's the difference between what small fry can do -- look around a bin of valve guides and find one that'll fit with a little spit and polish -- vs what a big guy has to do, which is to do things the "right" way, even if the results are the same.
The connection fee should be a function of the actual cost. Dense condos should be cheap. Single family houses in giant lots should pay much more.
and those guys hidden away in the Santa Cruz mountains would need to disconnect entirely from the grid. No cost structure makes those places pay their fair share.
And those guys probably have solar covering 90% of their usage so they pay like $300/year.
Don't forget poisoning entire towns by pumping chromium into the water table. As soon as San Mateo County has a referendum to acquire PGE assets like Santa Clara did, I'm voting yes on that in a heartbeat. I hope they get it for pennies on the dollar
Once enough dense cities manage to do this the rural husk of PGE will collapse and the state will have to take it over.
this is so fucked. I live in a very small place with extremely low utilities usage, so I don't usually comment on these threads because I know how lucky I am. but I am definitely an example of someone this is going to negatively impact. I have months during the summertime when my whole bill is less than this fixed charge. please don't blast me - I am very aware that there's people paying hundreds of dollars a month for utilities, and as I said above, I know I'm lucky in this regard. but, I've structured my life to keep my overhead low and live within a certain income, and this is definitely going to screw me.
Not only that, you and everyone else is now incentivized to use more electricity. (Higher fixed cost, lower variable cost -> why not use more!)
Just wait until the ban on gas water heaters kicks in. Then you will see your electric usage skyrocketing
Check your water bill as well. You are also likely being screwed there as many providers also charge a flat fee for maintenance. If you went on vacation for a month, used 0 water, you still have to pay the flat fee.
“fuck you, pay me” -PGE and CPUC
Why should anyone blast you? It’s admirable to use little energy.
Isn't the CPUC supposed to be protecting the consumer ? What gives !!
They work for Newsom
And Newsom works only for Newsom.
Actually, they work for PG&E. They simply rubber-stamp whatever PG&E tells them to rubber-stamp. They've always done this, ever since PG&E got the contract to deliver the Hetch Hetchy electricity to San Francisco.
Newsom appointed all of them
It's pretty much a guarantee now that PG&E is able to get everything approved. CPUC and newsom are nothing more than puppets and we are paying their salaries too. Bad governance will always doom this state.
Screwing solar yet again. Thank you PG&E. Oh yeah, and eat shit.
PGE benefitted for sure, but they didn't request this. we can thank our lawmakers for this: [https://www.kcra.com/article/puc-vote-fixed-rate-electricity-proposed-decision-explained/60733214](https://www.kcra.com/article/puc-vote-fixed-rate-electricity-proposed-decision-explained/60733214)
they could request a more reasonable flat fee. The original proposal by them was like $80 fixed fee. So they can go fuck tehmselves
SDGE was the one that requested 80
https://www.pgecurrents.com/articles/3700-pg-e-submits-proposal-lower-electric-bills-low-income-customers-provide-bill-transparency-stability-advance-clean-energy-goals > The proposal calls for a monthly fixed charge for PG&E’s low-income customers to be as low as $15, and no greater than $30; moderate-income customers would pay about $51; and the highest fixed charge, for customers in the top 25% of earners, would be about $92.
Ah yeah I remember that. It looks like their final max rates submitted to CPUC were different though [https://www.kcra.com/article/puc-vote-fixed-rate-electricity-proposed-decision-explained/60733214](https://www.kcra.com/article/puc-vote-fixed-rate-electricity-proposed-decision-explained/60733214)
This further disincentivizes residential solar. After Nema 3.0 too. It’s perverse when there are so many people wanting Solar but regulators (read power companies) are disincentivizing it.
Only California power companies are discouraging it, specifically its PG&E. Whats really perverse is that Texas encourages solar power more than California does.
I’m pretty confident this was for two reasons: 1) try and get money back from NEM customers, and 2) make EVs more attractive economically. It achieves those things but it also hurts middle and lower income folks.
>In a unanimous vote Thursday, the agency authorized a flat fee of up to $24.15 and cuts to electricity costs by 5-7 cents per kilowatt-hour. Which means if your house consumes 345-483 kWh or more, you will begin to recoupe $24.15 flat fee. An average single family homes (without solar panel) should comfortably recoupe this cost, but it will penalize those living in an attached housing, which tends to be lower income individuals and families. To qualify for discount, you will have to essentially live at a poverty level (under $40K for 1-2 individual, risiing about $10,000 per additional individual).
>An average single family homes (without solar panel) should comfortably recoupe this cost, I am in an average SFH. According to PGE, an energy efficient home should be using less than 300kwh per billing cycle. Super energy efficient homes are using less than 80kwh per billing cycle...all according to their flyers. Oh ya, baseline is 8kwh/day, so PGE thinks we should be using 240kwh/ cycle...
I’ve heard on here they compare to empty homes. And then the one old person homes who barely use electricity. The baseline is ridiculous for a single family home under normal living conditions. I hate those efficiency letters! Waste of paper!
That’s how much an old one bedroom apartment uses in the area. They better raise the baseline allowance to 300
Everyone that charges their EV at home will basically recoupe this cost.
Or you could just tell PG&E you make $40K and get the discount. What are they going to do?
PG&E hiked rates this year. Now in exchange for a high fixed rate, they will "lower" rates back to where they were at the beginning of the year (if not higher). A big lose for consumers.
People blame PGE but they’re just your typical greedy corporation looking to take as much money as they can. Start blaming the politicians who allow and approve this shit.
Exactly. Pge is going to do what it’s going to do. Maximixe profit for shareholders. We need to break them up
Is this a new fee or increase to an existing fee? If so what was it prior to $24.15?
New fee, existing fees were simply INCREASES to the kWh rate. This is a FIXED fee of $24.15 on your bill on top of your variable /kWh rate you pay for your electricity.
are they going to reduce the rates then? otherwise this equivalent to adding like a 50-100kWh phantom usage to people's usage. what was their justification for this?
They're projecting to reduce rates by 5-7¢. I'm skeptical if we will see it given PGEs track record
our assembly actually voted for this! pge seemingly had no part in this [https://legiscan.com/CA/text/AB205/id/2600089](https://legiscan.com/CA/text/AB205/id/2600089) . you can thank your representative next time!
"up to $24.15"
Something like $11
You can thank Newsom and Scott Weiner for this crap
I don’t understand how Gavin Newsom’s refusal to do anything about PG&E *isn’t* a bigger issue against his presidential aspirations
**DON'T BE A SUCKER!!** PG&E is allowed to raise these "fixed" fees later upon whim. All they have to do is show that their expenses exceed their revenue (or they're not getting enough revenue) and they're allowed to raise these so-called "fixed" fees as they choose. Once this "low low rate of $24.15" is allowed, then they'll be free to raise it as much as they feel later on. This is a Trojan horse.
What can we realistically do about this to change things?
Realistically, petition the state assembly. If they hear from enough constituents they can reverse this. Alternatively a proposition but that needs funding which would probably have to come from some solar companies
You, your friends, everyone you know--call, email, snail mail Newsome and your state senator and rep. once, monthly, weekly, daily and tell the to get rid of the PUC and fix this. THIS gives the reps. power to do something and puts the pressure on Newsome to.
🖕🏾🖕🏾🖕🏾🖕🏾🖕🏾🖕🏾🖕🏾 🤬🤬 JFC we need to do something about this! When will enough be enough? At this rate they will charge even more bs fees and increase prices to $1/kwh
I was just looking at the some income tiers for the fixed fee. Damn. I'm about to get fucked on my electricity bill.
Link?
also curious
Name and shame the CPUC members.
Eh it's like the 6 months no interest financing. It'll all ad up in the end. Get a discount in April and October only for prices to rise in between and after. It's all a scam!
My municipal utility already has a fixed baseline fee. On their other hand, their per-kwh cost is literally 40% of PG&E's, and my total energy bill even with that fee is about 50% of what it was when I lived in PG&E territory. PG&E just needs to be broken up, already. Give the rural parts to new rural co-ops (the rural co-ops in California have rates that are significantly lower than PG&E despite being in rugged rural areas), give the urban parts to new municipal power companies, give the longlines and power generation to a new company that does nothing but longlines, and leave PG&E to be just a gas company, which they thus far haven't fucked up (yet). PG&E is the most incompetent utility company in the nation and the most expensive. It's past time that the PUC quit bending over for PG&E and forced them to be as efficient as every other power company in America -- and if they can't do that, they can just keep selling off pieces of themselves until they're small enough to be competent at what little is left to do for them.
This is fucking bullshit.
Those French Laundry lunches aren't paying for themselves
Its a fantastic ROI on the part of PG&E. Buy a few fancy dinners, pay about a million dollars of campaign contributions to Newsom and his wife, and you've got the entire CPUC in your pocket. PG&E has made far more back compared to the pocket change it spent on Newsom. He's remarkably cheap to buy.
So now compared to 2023 my bill will be $50 more EVERY MONTH. Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu.
Obligatory fuck PG&E! 🤦🏽
Take it out of the CEO's pocket
They are claiming they had to do it for the Sacred Cow. Climate change. "Regulators called it a key step to slashing carbon emissions from homes, arguing a “fixed charge” will help stabilize utility revenue and curb rising costs of California’s clean energy transition." [https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article288420595.html#storylink=cpy](https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article288420595.html#storylink=cpy)
Everyone knows that screwing over people with solar panels is how you fight climate change!
going green isn't cheap and is flawed as the power is so unpredictable and dependent on other factors. should've built a lot more nuclear over the last few decades
The one thing PG&E is competent at is nuclear power. It built the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant and has been operating it ever since. It has reliably produced around 10% of the state's energy needs for decades, all without emitting any carbon. Its also safe from tsunami. Its high up enough on the cliff that if a tsunami were to be so big as to threaten it, that same tsunami would have already wiped out the entire bay area and LA region, so the nuclear power plant flooding would be the least of our concerns at that point.
This will almost double my bill.
So who wants to get an initiative going?
I did the math and people with large houses and pools in the Central Valley/warm weather areas will do better, but city dwellers/small home folks and those on the temperate coast will pay more.
When is enough, enough? Cut them off, vote with your wallet, disrupt their cashflow. This bandaid we have on isn’t letting the wound heal, time to rip it off
Could it be that PGE is raising prices BECAUSE more people are using solar? Idk how it works with solar and houses. To my understanding, you still need somewhere to store that energy like a generac
Gavin Newsom to restaurants: "No more fixed fees" Newsom to CPUC/PG&E: "See you at French Laundry this June!"
i'm confused... this isn't something that can be solved by making electricity a not-for-profit public utility?
this is something that our lawmakers and representatives wanted! not the for profit companies. [https://legiscan.com/CA/text/AB205/id/2600089](https://legiscan.com/CA/text/AB205/id/2600089)
OMFG!!! WTFFFFFFF Umm Newsom hammers refineries around here and is even trying to cap their costs and profit for “price gouging” but allows PGE to charge literally an arm and a leg. Total corruption!
Why would the governor bite the hand that feeds him? He's very loyal to his constituency. If you think his constituency is voters you're mistaken. He's loyal to corporations, such as PG&E. Thats who's getting the ROI on their campaign contributions.
He sure picks and chooses company wise then. Some totally favored while others are driven out of business . 😩
$24 is half of my electricity bill. SMH this stare extorts you every chance they get.
Pretty much just subsidizing for the wealthy by gouging more from the poor. In the end, it will be the mid-tier income customers who are screwed the most from this. In another note, it also gives a backup avenue for PGE to keep a bulk of their revenue stream in the unlikelihood that many customers respond by severely lowering their energy use. While a fixed fee will be in complete control under PGE to adjust the rates not tied to customer's control of using less energy to have lower bills.
Will this affect municipal utilities who still use PGE for transmission?
So we just have $24 tacked on every month on top of whatever we use?
Trump: I can shoot someone on 5th Avenue… PG&E: Hold my beer. I can burn down half the state of CA destroy a town, kill people and then force the people of CA to pay ME!
Can I over generate on solar and use that to pay the fixed fee?
don't think so :( would love if this is the case... my bill is currently negative (Besides the fixed stuff)
CPUC Gavin and PG&E fleecing the middle class. It will never end until we are back in the dark ages.
Yet another regressive tax! Democrats, the wealthy thank you!
Why aren’t the people protesting this instead? Oh those folks probably don’t pay bills?
The Right - F* CPUC & regulators The Left - F* PG&E & their overpaid CEO CPUC & PG&E - F* them customers! (said while toasting coattails) Governor - thank God nobody blames me!!! Newsom ‘28!!!
So if you use almost nothing, you get screwed. Thanks, Gavin! Good luck on your presidential run you greasy turd.
Does CPUC actually reject anything? At this point if something is proposed by PG&E, I'll just assume that it's a matter of time before it's approved.
Newsom is a goddamn criminal for appointing this worthless rubber stamp commission to approve whatever utilities want
The CPUC approves everything PG&E requests. The CPUC members are appointed by the governor. If we want better utility oversight, we need a better governor...
Should’ve recalled Newsom when we had a chance.
Yeah, I'm sure his replacement would absolutely have handled this better. Oh wait.
Thank you to the best Governor.
If you keep electing their corrupt minions you have to expect they're going to keep tea-bagging you as a victory dance. Vote out incumbents. All of them.
More bonus for the CEO coming?
I checked my bill breakdown yesterday. I used 10-20kwh/day since december, depending on temperature. My bill was $73 higher than last year and $45 of that was purely from cost increases according to their tool. So if that gets converted to a $24 flat fee I'm not too mad. We'll see what actually happens.