Public Service Company of New Mexico files for 2024 rate changes
Public Service Company of New Mexico (PNM) filed a request with the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission (NMPRC) to change its electricity rates.
The filing is for a total rate base of $2.7 billion, an increase of $336 million from PNM’s last general rate filing in December 2016. Overall, the average monthly residential customer bill will rise just $0.75 per month or 0.9 percent.
The requested change primarily reflects investments the company, which is owned by PNM Resources, has made in transmission and distribution infrastructure. In particular, the company is focused on expanding and improving its aging infrastructure to provide the underlying infrastructure crucial to a successful energy transition.
“Ultimately, the necessary and ongoing transformation of PNM’s energy grid can only happen with new and continued investments,” officials stated in the executive summary of the filing.
Also factored are increased operating costs reflecting six years of inflation, as well as maintenance increases to enhance vegetation management programs to protect lines and support wildfire mitigation efforts.
Those investment costs are largely offset by cost reductions resulting from PNM’s transition to lower-cost, clean energy generation resources. Specifically, the retirement of the San Juan Generating Station and the expiration of leased capacity from the Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station have reduced costs within base rates, as have reductions to fuel costs recovered through a rate rider.
“There is no question that reducing generation costs through the energy transition is helping keep customer bills affordable. The removal of costs associated with the now abandoned San Juan coal plant, for example, has helped offset the significant increases PNM has seen in providing quality service to customers,” the executive summary states.
If approved by the commission, the proposed change in customer rates would take effect by Jan. 1, 2024.
PNM Resources is an energy holding company based in Albuquerque. Through its regulated utilities, PNM and TNMP, PNM Resources provides electricity to approximately 800,000 homes and businesses in New Mexico and Texas. It has a goal to achieve 100 percent emissions-free energy by 2040.
