I feel like most people don’t realize that utility companies don’t actually make most of their profit from selling electricity. They make it by investing in infrastructure. Because they’re regulated monopolies, they go through “rate cases” where the government approves projects and guarantees them a return on those investments, which they then charge their customers then pay back over time.
In 2025 alone, investor-owned utilities requested a record $22 billion in rate increases, largely tied to renewable energy, storage, and grid upgrades. The news is that historically, the majority of these projects do get approved.
On one hand, it's accelerating the clean energy transition. On the other, it’s driving noticeable increases in customer bills. At the same time, installing solar at home is still expensive and many utilities push back on policies like net metering that would make it more accessible and worthwhile to decentralize from the utility company.
It seems like customers are funding the transition either way but not always clearly benefiting from lower energy costs.
Does this model feel fair, or does it need to evolve?
(1) U.S. Energy Information Administration – Utility revenue models & cost-of-service regulation
(2) National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners – Rate case & regulated return framework
(3) S&P Global Market Intelligence – 2025 utility rate case filings (~$22B)
(4) Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory – High approval rates for utility infrastructure / transmission & interconnection trends
(5) Brookings Institution & National Renewable Energy Laboratory – Net metering debates & distributed solar economics