CHICAGO -- Millions of Illinoisans could see higher energy bills next year, but how much higher will be determined by a state agency whose oversight powers recently were expanded.
The number of cases in front of the ICC is due, in part, to a pair of major policy changes affecting the way utilities request rate increases and the commission's authority to amend those requests. For electric utilities, that means a more complicated, multiyear rate-setting process and a more thorough review of profit margins. For gas companies, that means more scrutiny of infrastructure costs.
And while Pritzker hasn't weighed in on the electric cases, he wrote a March op-ed in the Chicago Sun-Times calling for increased accountability for gas companies. Advocates say that program -- referred to as the"qualified infrastructure plant," or QIP -- encouraged wasteful capital spending. For example, the consumer advocacy group Illinois PIRG says Peoples Gas' pipeline replacement program in the Chicago area has been mismanaged and overly broad, although the utility says the program is needed to reduce safety risk.
"We're making ongoing investments in system integrity and QIP, no QIP, that commitment to safe and reliable gas delivery service doesn't change," Matthew Tomc, an executive at Ameren that oversees government affairs, said in an interview. "This rate increase is necessary to run our business due to inflation and rising global impacts that continue to affect our operating and maintenance costs," Nicor Gas spokesperson Jennifer Golz said in an email statement.
"Not only is Peoples Gas requesting a record-high rate hike at the same time that they are raking in record profits, but take a look, a real close look, at who will bear this burden: the working people of Chicago, people of color," the city's treasurer, Melissa Conyears-Ervin, said at a June 1 news conference.
CEJA also ended a controversial formula rate-making process that was a product of ComEd's lobbying efforts a decade earlier. The formula-based rates were a major focus of the recent federal criminal corruption trial that ended with the conviction of ComEd's former CEO and three ex-lobbyists.
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