Georgia’s power is on the ballot this fall, but advocates worry few of the state’s voters actually know what’s at stake in the Nov. 4 Georgia Public Service Commission. After a low turnout in the June primary election, climate advocates are working to get out the vote for the state’s energy future.
On Sept. 4 to 6, a coalition of climate nonprofits like Climate Power, 350 Action, Georgia Conservation Voters Education Fund and more are hosting “Watts at Stake: Georgia PSC Summit” in Atlanta to mobilize communities around the race. The event will feature panels with advocates and influencers at the Loudermilk Center.
It’s a vital race for Georgia residents. The two elected candidates will sit on the five-person Public Service Commission, each serving a six-year term. Currently, all PSC members are Republicans.
But what does the PSC actually do? Essentially, the five-person commission controls the bills of 2.7 million Georgia Power customers, and the dollar cost has only climbed in recent years.
Commissioners set gas and electricity rates for residents, but they also decide how to charge massive energy consumers like data centers. The commission also gets to pass on construction costs for projects like Plant Vogtle onto people’s power bills.
Powerlines founder Charles Hua is leading the PSC push. His organization works to educate and advocate for energy consumers, with a specific focus on the commission. Hua thinks Georgia is the “first test” in a nationwide energy affordability issue.
“These are the U.S. Supreme Court justices of energy,” Hua said. “They determine how much people pay for energy, what types of energy utilities invest in and where these projects are located.”
About 200 commissioners across the country control more than $200 billion a year in utility spending, Hua explained, but very few people can name who they are or what they do.
His nonprofit conducted polls that found three in four Americans are concerned about rising utility bills, and four out of five feel powerless to change things.
That’s where Georgia comes in. It’s one of ten states that elect regulators, and for the first time in three years, there are two on the ballot this year. Georgia Conservation Voters Political Director Connie DiCicco said it’s an “inflection point.”
But only 3 percent of Georgia voters turned out for the June primary election. For the District 2 seat, incumbent Tim Echols won the Republican primary and uncontested Alicia Johnson won the Democratic Primary. Incumbent Fitz Johnson took the Republican primary for District 3, while Peter Hubbard beat out Keisha Waites for the Democratic nomination in a July 15 runoff election.
The candidates are set, so now the climate advocates are working to bring people to the polls in November. Organizers like Omega Calhoun, the lead of the Georgia for Black Futures Lab, said utilities have played into housing affordability concerns for many Black Georgians.
Calhoun, a Valdosta resident, said his power bill increased by over $65 in a three-month period, and other residents in the area have seen even higher increases on fixed incomes. The Lab has canvassed, door-knocked, and phone-banked to tell these residents they have a say in their bills.
“We get out in the community, and we actually get a chance to actually talk to people and find out that a lot of them are unaware and they are not knowledgeable of ways that they can actually help themselves,” Calhoun said. “It’s realizing that we, as the citizens, the residents, we’re the ones who hold the power to change our situations.”
For the next two months, the climate coalition hopes to keep getting out the word about the race and getting voters to understand their own power in the upcoming election.
“This is absolutely an election about affordability and helping them to see that they can directly affect what happens next,” DiCicco said. “I think that’s where all of us here can make a very big difference in the landscape, the actual landscape and future of Georgia.”
Peter Hubbard actually knows the electricity regulation business and along with a reform-minded Alicia Johnson will mark a huge change for a hitherto complicit PSC.
What many don’t realize is that our high energy bills are directly tied to Georgia’s Public Service Commissioners rubber-stamping every Georgia Power request for expensive fossil fuel projects. This keeps locking us into costly new gas plants and additional gas infrastructure, and it subjects us to volatile gas pricing.
Energy experts have attended Commission hearings and testified that solar, wind, and battery storage—combined with efficiency programs and virtual power plants—can meet our electricity needs more cheaply and reliably. Yet the Commission keeps choosing the expensive path that benefits Georgia Power’s profits over ratepayers.
The long-term costs are even worse. Climate scientists warn that sticking with fossil fuels means higher insurance rates, higher air conditioning bills, rising food costs, higher taxes to pay for disaster recovery and military responses to climate-driven global instability, and much more.
Here’s what we can do: elect new Public Service Commissioners who will actually represent Georgia families instead of utility shareholders. Early voting runs October 14-31, with Election Day on November 4.
This is one of the most important races on the ballot that nobody talks about—but it directly impacts Georgia Power customer’s monthly bills and the future for all of our kids and grandkids and beyond.
In order for Georgia to have a clean energy future, we need Peter Hubbard and Alicia Johnson.