After 2025, Portland General Electric will make every effort to keep residential rate increases below the rate of inflation.
In a letter to Pope on Wednesday, U.S. Senator Ron Wyden stated that Maria Pope, the president and CEO of PGE, had made that commitment.
According to Wyden’s spokesperson, Hank Stern, the senator personally visited with Pope earlier this month in Washington, D.C., where she told him that.
After Wyden, a Democrat from Oregon, wrote Pope a letter at the end of November requesting her to explain why electric costs have increased by almost 40 percent over the previous four years, they met. Wyden claimed that he was inspired to compose the first letter by the overwhelming outpouring of concerns regarding recent hikes in electricity rates.
Popehad said that increased rates were caused by higher open-market power costs and growing demand from power-hungry data centers and other industrial users.
Following their in-person meeting, Wyden reiterated what he had heard in a follow-up letter on Wednesday.
Wyden stated that in addition to limiting residential rate increases to less than the rate of inflation, Pope also pledged to do all within his power to prevent residential customers’ electricity costs from rising as a result of increased industrial use.
According to PGE spokesperson Drew Hanson, the company is making efforts to prevent residential customers from being adversely impacted by the rise in electrical demand.
We are dedicated to providing consumers with dependable, secure, safe, and increasingly renewable energy while striving to maintain rates as low as possible since we understand that growing energy costs are a hardship. “Hanson said.”
Gosia Wozniacka discusses a variety of environmental topics, including climate change, environmental justice, and the switch to sustainable energy. You may contact her at 971-421-3154 or [email protected].
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