After 15 years of construction, on April 30, 2024, Georgia Power completed construction of two new nuclear reactors at Plant Vogtle, near Waynesboro, Georgia. As a result, Georgia Power will increase residential rates 23.7 percent to pay for its construction, on top of the $1,000 Georgia Power has already collected from customers from an on-bill tariff.
If Plant Vogtle is driving a 23.7 percent rate increase, why haven’t you heard that number before now? You can blame Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Associated Press reporters for simply taking Georgia Power’s messaging and doing little independent research, and you can blame the Georgia Public Service Commission for not providing information on customer impacts from rate cases.
Here’s something that would have been nice for media outlets to do: explain to readers that rates make up just 47 percent of a Georgia Power bill. Fuel surcharges, tariffs, and fees add another 53 percent. When Georgia Power says, “Our rates are 10 percent below the national average,” that is deeply disingenuous. People don’t pay rates; they pay bills. When it comes to bills, Georgia’s electricity bills are ranked 6th highest in the nation.
And no, it’s not because we live in the south. If that were true then Florida and North Carolina would be ranked similarly. The reason is because Georgia Power blocks cost-savings programs that are routine in other states because those programs reduce profits.
And let me be clear — when it comes to profits, there has been a great fraud perpetrated on the people of Georgia related to Plant Vogtle. This power plant is likely the biggest capitalist transfer of wealth from customers to a corporation in U.S. history. At $35 billion, that is an unfathomable sum for a single power plant. How did that happen?
In 2017 when main Vogtle contractor Westinghouse went bankrupt from the severe cost overruns that took place between 2009 and 2017, Georgia PSC staff and energy experts recommended canceling Plant Vogtle. Analysis showed that this energy was not needed, the project was too expensive, and that building an equivalent amount of generation from non-nuclear sources would cost far less than finishing Vogtle.
Commissioners ignored these recommendations, and over the next seven years, the worst warnings came true.
This also dramatically impacts the PSC elections — or rather, a lack thereof. As a recap, in 2022 two PSC seats up for election were put on hold by a federal judge after litigation by a group of four Black plaintiffs proved that the statewide method of electing members of Georgia’s Public Service Commission discriminates against Black voters.
A federal judge blocked the state from using at-large voting for PSC Commissioners until the legislature could change the law to end Black voter disenfranchisement.
But state officials had no intention of allowing Black voters to influence PSC elections. In Georgia, PSC elections are strongly racially polarized, with nearly 100 percent of Black voters preferring Democrats over Republicans and nearly 100 percent of white voters preferring Republicans over Democrats. By allowing PSC elections to take place statewide rather than district-wide, Republicans ensure that Black voters can never elect a PSC Commissioner of their preference.
So after the August 2022 ruling, state officials appealed, claiming that they weren’t discriminating against Black voters. They just want Republicans to win, and that’s not illegal. The appeal was heard on Dec. 14, 2022, in the U.S. 11th District Court of Appeals, and after making everyone wait an entire year during which they issued rulings on far less time-sensitive cases, the three-judge panel ruled in November 2023 to overturn the lower court’s ruling.
I frankly don’t know how the attorneys who represented the state can live with themselves knowing that in 140 years, only one Black person has been elected to PSC, and they defended such injustice. And I don’t know how the 11th Circuit Court judges can ignore the federal Voting Rights Act and allow Georgia to disenfranchise Black voters. We know whose side these attorneys and judges would have worked for during the Jim Crow era — the segregationists. Shame on them.
The one-year delay in issuing their ruling conveniently allowed Commissioners time to give Georgia Power the Vogtle’s billions in cost overruns without facing voters. That timing seems astonishing to me.
In early March Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger announced he was cancelling PSC elections for the year, claiming there wasn’t time to schedule them. Of course he has time, unless he also doesn’t have time to schedule primary run-off elections should that be necessary?
And in April the Georgia legislature passed a law that added two years to the commissioner’s already long six-year term, allowing them to remain in office for eight or nine years without elections, the very definition of a stolen election.
Why all this fighting and litigation over the PSC? Because billions of dollars are at stake. Electricity is an essential service that people must be able to afford. It is not simply a matter of losing lights: people can be evicted from their homes, they can lose custody of their children, or they can die without fans or oxygen in Georgia’s brutal summer heat. At one especially fractious hearing during a big rate increase last year, one woman asked commissioners, “Do you know how many people I have buried due to HEAT?” as part of her request not to increase rates.
They did.
What other important groups besides Black voters are not represented on the Commission? All five commissioners pay their private homes’ utility bills to electric membership corporations (EMCs). Those utilities are nonprofits run by governing boards made up of their own customers. EMCs would never allow a non-customer to run their utility. Yet customers of Georgia Power, a for-profit corporation, have no one at the Commission representing them.
Not all Republicans are okay with what is happening at the Commission. That was seen when the Georgia Senate unanimously passed legislation to reinstate a Consumer Utility Counsel to represent consumers at PSC rate proceedings, but which did not make out of the House, and the legislature passed a law to stop data center tax breaks and form an electricity study committee. Governor Kemp unfortunately vetoed that law.
It is time for Republicans and Democrats to unite against a wealthy utility that has infiltrated our government and systems. A powerful monopoly in control of an entire industry making investments that harm customers while delivering enormous profits to itself is not what anyone wants.
We must change how Georgia Power is compensated so they are rewarded for reducing costs. We must reinstate an independently funded Consumer Utility Counsel to represent residential consumers and small business interests at PSC proceedings. And we must change PSC elections so that Black voters may elect a candidate of their preference in districts in which they have the majority. With these measures, Georgia would quickly drop out of the top 10 rankings for most expensive utility bills in the country.
Durand has proven that she’s the responsible choice for regime change at GA’s “Public” Service Commission. She listens, asks the discomforting questions and seeks the educated and right solutions for consumers…
Blatant corruption. AJC is even bought off. And this outrageous consumer price hike for electricity is piled on top of the disregard for skyrocketed housing costs. What are fixed & low income people supposed to do to survive? Looks like the plan is more people living in the streets.
The article is simply wrong. I have homes in RI and Atlanta and RI bills are much higher than Georgia. I guess US Energy Information Administration is in league with Georgia Power with their representation of costs by state:
https://www.eia.gov/electricity/state/
Here is a cnet study with bills by state that shows they broadly follow rates by state with Florida and Georgia about the same:
https://www.cnet.com/home/energy-and-utilities/electricity-rates-by-state/
Every single article except Forbes “analysis of BLS data” shows Georgia as average and RI as high and that is consistent with my own personal experience paying bills in both places.
The commentary is false.
you missed the point John; rates does not equal Bills. Where else are customers forced to pay for a monopoly’s mistakes with add-on fees?
John, the CNET data shows Rhode Island as high, but every single study other than theirs (Forbes, Nerd Wallet, many others) shows that Georgia’s bills are fifth or sixth highest in the nation.
The EIA data you link compares rates, not bills. Did you miss the part of my essay that said rates are not the same as bills and that rates make up less than half the bill?
I guess you can believe CNET and ignore Forbes, and pull in EIA data that shows rates to support your claim, and focus on your own anecdotal experience if you want to. But that would be wrong.
The column is factually incorrect in comparison to every article I have read.
The US Energy Information Administration reports on the cost of energy and finds Georgia to be just below average and Florida just above average. For the states pursuing the “green” energy policies which appear to be advocated by Durand, California and the Northeast, EIA shows energy prices that are dramatically higher than Georgia. Another review at CNET goes on to assert the average bill in Georgia is slightly below Florida. The Forbes.com article does not include the graph shown which is quite misleading in its use: the Florida average bill is shown as $130.40 by Forbes and $131.39 by CNET. The Georgia average bill is shown as $134.11 by Forbes and $129.41 by CNET.
https://www.eia.gov/electricity/state/
https://www.cnet.com/home/energy-and-utilities/electricity-rates-by-state/
Note to moderator: I attempted to post previously and saw my comment awaiting moderation and then deleted. If you find this post to be unacceptable, please explain to me how I may offer objective data such as that above as a rebuttal to what appears to be the misinformation in this column. Thank you.
You are comparing bills to rates, which Durand clearly states is like comparing apples to oranges. More importantly, it has nothing to do with the lack of representation of people of color on the PSC, or the wealth transfer from the public to Georgia Power and its shareholders that occurred because the PSC allowed Georgia Power to shift the costs and the substantial overruns from Vogtle’s construction to consumers rather than shareholders.
Thank you Patty Durand for shining a light on Georgia Power’s self interest and greed. Appreciate your championing of consumer rights! Bravo.
HISTORY
BIGGEST SCAM ON ELDERLY in Georgia history is the outrageous electric bill Vogtle Venture Surcharge Scam by the 2009 legislature, governor, and Georgia Power. Forced to give their money, many died paying the surcharges. ALSO Millions in SCHOOL TAXES were misdirected by the surcharges scam to help Georgia Power finance their troubled venture construction. Several bills to limit the surcharges were introduced and then killed by “guess who” at the capitol.
The Vogtle Venture Surcharge Scam fed around $4,000,000,000.00 to monopoly Georgia Power. Billions for free from elderly, schools, auto repaie shops, homeowners, renters, small businesses, churches, meals on wheels, all their captive customers (the big industrial customers got a break, -another ugly facet of the venture).
Yes. Georgians who are captive customers of monopoly Georgia Power pay in the HIGHEST ELECTRIC BILLS in the US.
And with the huge costs jolts of the Albatros Edsel of Electricity, the “Vogtle Venture” on our backs, we will be moving unfortunately more higher.
Thanks for writing this, Patty! Such important information for everyone to know.
I question your state ranking of bills. You left off California, which I believe has the highest bills in the country.
BJ you are getting rates confused with bills. California does not have the highest bills. California might have high rates but it ranks 23rd place for bills because of fees, riders, surcharges and tariffs that other state add to their bills. Source: https://www.forbes.com/home-improvement/living/monthly-utility-costs-by-state/.
This is a very good article. Exposing the corruption in Georgia Power is the key to getting lower bills and better service. Georgia is in the top ten states with the most frequent power outages. https://www.mroelectric.com/blog/most-least-power-outages/
Shame on you Georgia Power and your bought off republican politicians.
This column is amply justified and should be read by all Georgians. The state’s dominant decision-makers are fixated on a pro-growth agenda that they conflate with aggressive corporate motives that exploit the public by disempowering customers, voters, and citizens. Such exploitation not only harms the public financially, but it has destructive environmental consequences that degrade our health and quality of life. Short-term profitmaking is a reckless, foolhardy basis for state policies that defiantly disparage the public interest.
I volunteer with Community Assistance Center, a non-profit serving Sandy Springs and Dunwoody that provides financial assistance to tenants unable to pay their monthly rent. Most of our clients face landlords who threaten eviction even if they are one month late for reasons that are out of their control, such as job loss or having to work reduced hours. On top of that, they are charged a late fee of as much as $400 and often are required to pay for the eviction proceedings landlords initiate. For these people, utility payments are a huge financial burden, and many have to choose between paying rent or paying a Georgia Power utility bill. For many of them, utility assistance is unavailable and Georgia Power often cuts them off. A program called LIHEAP intended to assist is generally out of funding. PSC Commissioners seldom seem to consider the severe consequences for ordinary people of their rate hikes — perhaps because, as Patty Durand stated, none of them are customers of Georgia Power.
Where else is a Private for-profit company allowed a state-sanctioned monopoly, and to transfer risk and costs from their own operations to customers as a ‘surcharge’?
China and Russia are two examples.
Prediction: In 5 years all the sniping against Vogtle will have ended. In 10 years people will try to claim credit for Vogtle. Vogtle was an industry restart learning curve project. America’s malfeasance ruined the Nuclear Construction Industry and the knowledge retired. Contrived Wind Solar Only accounting pretends cheap power. Nuclear costs more to build but it’s more dependable and cheaper to the consumer in the long run. Georgia’s rates are a lot cheaper than California’s.