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PGE will try to keep housing rate increases below inflation, says Senator Wyden

PGE will try to keep housing rate increases below inflation, says Senator Wyden

Portland General Electric will do “everything possible” to keep housing rate increases below inflation after 2025.

This is a promise from PGE President and CEO Maria Pope, according to a letter sent to Pope by U.S. Senator Ron Wyden on Wednesday.

The senator met Pope in person earlier this month in Washington, D.C., where she made the statement to him, Wyden’s spokesman Hank Stern said.

Their meeting came after Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, wrote a letter to Pope in late November asking her to explain why electric bills have risen more than 40 percent in the last four years. Wyden said a wave of concern over recent electricity price increases prompted him to write the first letter.

Pope had responded, pointing out that higher open market electricity costs and increasing demand from power-hungry data centers and other industrial users were the culprits for the rising tariffs.

After the two met in person, Wyden sent another letter Wednesday repeating what he had heard.

Wyden said Pope not only promised to keep residential rate increases below the rate of inflation, but also promised to “take every possible step to ensure that an increase in industrial use does not result in an increase in residential electricity rates.”

PGE spokesman Drew Hanson said the utility is working to ensure growth in electricity demand does not have an outsized impact on residential customers.

“We recognize that rising energy costs are a burden, and we are committed to providing our customers with reliable, safe and increasingly renewable energy while working to keep prices as low as possible,” Hanson said.

— Gosia Wozniacka covers environmental justice, climate change, the clean energy transition, and other environmental issues. Reach them at [email protected] or 971-421-3154.

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