Portland General Electric customers outraged over new energy prices - KATU

Portland General Electric customers outraged over new energy prices

PORTLAND, Ore. (KATU) — Some Portland General Electric customers are upset over their most recent energy bill. Last month, PGE said customers would start seeing an increase in their month bill of 18%.

The rate of the increase was decided in December by PGE and Oregon Public Utility Commission (PUC) based on the final power supply forecast.

“When I got my bill and it was $527 instead of $300 I was a little upset about that," PGE customer Kelly Lord told KATU. She said she excepted the 18%, but her latest bill appears to be higher than that percentage she was quoted.

“There are a lot of people living paycheck to paycheck this is huge for them," she explained.

Another PGE customer believes they were charged a 23.26% increase, rather than 18%.

PGE and Oregon Public Utility Commission claim the increase is due to multiple factors including improvements to the Faraday Resiliency and Repowering hydroelectric project and upgrades in transmission and distribution systems.

“If you look at the rates on our bills and the changes for our kilowatt per hour charge it’s exponentially more than that," another PGE customer Chris Boone said about his bill. It's because of the bill hike that he says he's starting a petition to bring the rates back down and said he would like an investigation done into these rate hikes.

PGE has said the exact amount bills will increase is based on customer type and energy usage.

On Friday, PGE sent this statement in response to the rate hikes saying "PGE is here to help all of our customers understand their bills and find programs that can help them save money and manage their energy use. We encourage any customer with questions or concerns to contact our customer service at 503-228-6322 or 800-542-8818."