Your NV Energy bill could be increasing by 9 percent in 2025.
NV Energy filed a regulatory rate review with the Public Utilities Commission of Nevada on Feb. 14 to recover costs from investments made prior to last summer’s “record-breaking heatwave,” which would increase their revenue by $215.7 million
With the rate change, the utility has also proposed three new policies to the PUCN pertaining to low-income customers, a residential and small commercial demand charge and improving how solar is billed. Additionally, they have requested to increase its return on equity, or how much the company can profit, from 9.5 percent to 10.25 percent.
“As a company, we are focused on ways to minimize energy cost impacts to our customers while ensuring we keep our customers safe during the hot summer months,” said NV Energy President and CEO Doug Cannon. “This is the core of what we do and the investments we are now seeking recovery for helped make sure we were able to meet the energy needs of every customer during those record summer days and throughout the year.”
The investments made include updating outdated technology and transmission infrastructure to ensure smooth operations, as well as the Silverhawk peakers project and the Reid Gardner battery storage project. In attempting to recover costs, the general rate review could result in a 9 percent increase in base rates.
Even with the 9 percent increase, NV Energy said Southern Nevada customers should be paying less for energy by the end of 2025 than they did in 2024. This is due to a reduction in market energy purchases during peak hours from NV Energy, as the company continues to produce energy from their own generating plants.
Other proposals from NV Energy
NV Energy has proposed removing its fixed basic service charge for low-income customers, saving them up to $18.50 on monthly bills.The fixed basic service charge covers the cost of connecting the customer to the utility service.
Customers with an annual income at or below 150 percent of the federal poverty level would have the charge dropped. If approved, the policy would go into affect on April 1, 2026.
The utility also wants to institute a residential and small commercial demand charge to encourage customers to spread energy usage of high-demand appliances, such as clothes dryers and pool pumps, throughout the day. Currently, larger customers like casinos have to pay demand charges, but this new proposal will add a new line item to residential and small commercial bills.
If a customer uses too much energy at one point in the day by using a high-demand item, the demand charge for that day will increase.
“This gives customers more control of their energy usage and puts less strain on the energy system at any one point in time,” NV Energy said in a news release.
This “control” allows for customers to either lower their bill by spreading their energy usage throughout the days and months or by lowering it volumetrically by using less energy.
“For example, for an average residential customer with a daily demand of 3.8 kW, the proposed demand charge of $0.19/kW will equate to a charge of $0.72/day, or $22/month,” said NV Energy in their testimony to the PUCN. “If the same costs were recovered through a volumetric rate of $0.02145, an average residential customer with monthly usage of 1,103 kWh would pay $23/month for these distribution costs, or $0.78/day.”
Finally, the 15-minute solar credit proposal is for new rooftop customers to improve how they are billed by measuring energy usage and credits every 15 minutes rather than monthly.
“This proposal allows for more accurate billing and is an improvement over current private solar credit policy – which is unfair for customers who cannot afford private rooftop solar systems but subsidize those who can,” said NV Energy in the release.
Current solar customers would be grandfathered into the new policy, which would take affect on Oct. 1 if approved.
No rate increases or policies have taken affect yet, as the rate review must go through a public review process with the Public Utilities Commission. If approved, the earliest it will take affect on Oct. 1, with others requesting to be implemented in April 2026.
This is a developing story. Check back for details.
