The Public Utilities Commission caught heat — while others stood outside in it — during a public meeting for consumers Tuesday.
The general consumer session was for ratepayers to provide input about any PUC regulated utility, but majority focused on one — NV Energy. More specifically, ratepayers focused on the demand charge and accused the commission of siding with the utility.
NV Energy originally intended for a daily demand charge, meant to offset the cost borne from serving solar customers, to be implemented in April, but the utility faced confusion and pushback that ultimately led the PUC to delay rate implementation to Jan. 1.
The PUC also faced heavy criticism from attendees for its heavy police and security presence, scheduling the meeting at 1:30 p.m., as well as making members of the public wait outside while temperatures reached 108 degrees.
A line of attendees wrapped around the building outside, with more than 100 members of the public waiting to give their comments or watch the meeting that lasted more than three hours. As others left the conference room, the PUC staff would allow more in. The commission also accepted written and call-in comments.
“Show me you don’t care about me,” said Fredrick Wright, a pastor and member of Faith in Action. “How do you do that? You schedule a meeting at 1:30 in the afternoon with most people at work. … You limit the capacity and leave disabled and elderly people out in the heat, the 105 degree heat.”
During the meeting, the PUC coordinated for Capitol Police to be present “to ensure the safety of employees and to minimize disruptions,” according to a representative from the commission.
“The police and security were on site to avoid disruptions as people entered or left the PUC office, which shares a complex with other businesses,” said the PUC representative.
Demand charge criticism
Many ratepayers and members of the public expressed their concerns over the demand charge.
Marie Steele, vice president of business technology at NV Energy, presided over the consumer session on Tuesday, alongside PUC commissioners. When she said “the daily demand is not a rate increase,” there was an audible groan.
“You lie,” said a member of the audience.
NV Energy has maintained the daily demand rate to offset the cost borne from serving net metering customers, commonly home or business owners with solar panels on their property. Between 2018 and 2024, the total cost shift borne by non-rooftop-solar customers in Southern Nevada was $424 million, a utility spokesperson told the Las Vegas Review-Journal last year.
The daily demand will create a two-pronged approach to billing customers each month: how many kilowatts a customer used during their highest 15-minute period of usage combined with the typical per kilowatt hours used each month.
Solar customers cannot use net metering credits to offset the cost of the demand charge and will see an around $12 increase in their bill, according to the utility. This left many solar customers feeling slighted.
Ratepayer Kenneth Band is retired military and on fixed income. He got solar panels because he was told it would make his energy bills go down.
“The average bill will, with the demand charge, drop for non-solar consumers by $3. Big deal,” said Band. “Solar panel owners will have their rates raised by $12 … Solar panels are saving you guys (NV Energy). I pay back what I don’t use. I don’t have batteries in my house.”
Jessica Padrón, associate state director of advocacy and outreach at AARP, was also present at the meeting to advocate against the demand charge, calling it “confusing and unpredictable to most consumers.”
“AARP Nevada also strongly opposes residential demand charges,” Padrón said. “Demand charges shift the risk from the utility to customers and can disproportionately harm older adults, low usage customers and households on fixed incomes.”
A Clark County District Court judge denied an attempt to overturn the daily demand charge from the Attorney General’s Bureau of Consumer Protection in May. Attorney General Aaron Ford said then that his office would appeal the decision to the Nevada Supreme Court.
Contact Emerson Drewes at edrewes@reviewjournal.com. Follow @EmersonDrewes on X.
