ComEd files state, federal rate increases for 2022

ComEd filed for its first electricity delivery rate increase in four years last week, requesting an increase of $51 million to acquiesce to both Illinois’ push for 100 percent clean energy and a need for improved reliability in the face of frequent storms.

“Making the power grid more resilient to severe storms, able to charge fleets of electric vehicles and maintain superior reliability as we bring more renewable energy onto the system requires thoughtful investment,” ComEd CEO Joe Dominguez said. “The cost of not making these investments is far greater. We’ve seen severe weather events in the last nine months lead to catastrophic grid failures in California and Texas. Last August, we restored power to more than half a million customers within 24 hours, record time, following the unprecedented derecho storm and 13 tornadoes that hit our region. If not for the smart grid investments we’ve made, that storm would have caused nearly twice as many interruptions, and restoration would have taken two weeks, as it did in parts of Iowa that were hit by the same storm.”

For the average residential customer, this rate hike would add approximately 20 cents per monthly bill. Funds raised by this would support expanding private and community solar, electric vehicle support, smart city technologies to monitor aspects like air quality and floods, and a multi-year program to increase customer savings through voltage optimization technology. That’s only if the request is approved, though — the Illinois Commerce Commission and other stakeholders will review ComEd’s actual costs for 2020 and its expected investments for 2021 and see if they align with the company’s desires for the new rates starting in January 2022.

Currently, ComEd’s average residential customer rates remain 17 percent lower than those of the 10 largest U.S. metropolitan areas, according to data collected by the Edison Electric Institute. Its commercial rates are 18 percent lower than others in the top 20 largest U.S. metropolitan areas.

At the same time, the company has submitted a Formula Rate Update request with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). That update would result in a monthly increase of about 70 cents for transmission services to expand power capacity and meet local demand. The distribution and transmission rate increases combined would bring the total average monthly bill for ComEd residential customers to about $83.