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Where the Money Went

The Stranger on Your Electric Bill

Your electric price isn't set by a market. People argue it out in a public room, and the real data center fight is over who pays if a giant customer's forecast never shows up.

Lena and Otis · 24 min · 26 Oct 2026

FactUnion VerifiedEvery fact on the episode's fact sheet was checked against its sources. Wrong facts were corrected. What this meansFacts checked 26 Oct 2026

Chapters (9)

About this episode

On Wednesday, October 21, 2026, Consumer Reports released a survey: 81% of people who've lived in the same home for at least three years say their electric bills went up, and 84% would support a separate rate category for big users like data centers. Lena and Otis follow that number into the place where electric prices actually get set: a rate case, a regulator splitting one bill among everybody, and a hearing room in Wisconsin where anyone can walk up to the mic.

It turns out a giant new customer can lower your bill or raise it. Which one you get depends on the fine print, and most of all on who holds the risk if the demand everyone forecast never arrives. The Pacific Northwest's aluminum smelters already ran that experiment once. Plus the rest of the week in one minute: oil, mortgages, consumer mood, coffins and canoes, and gas.

Hosted by Lena and Otis, performed by synthetic voices.

Facts and sources

Every fact used in this episode, with the sources it was checked against. Download as data

224 of 224 recorded lines matched the checked script.

  1. On Oct 21, 2026, Consumer Reports released a nationally representative survey of 2,003 US adults; 81% of those who have lived in the same home at least three years said their electricity bills increased during that time.

  2. In a Consumer Reports survey, 28% of Americans said their electricity bills increased by 20% to 49% over the past three years, 26% said by less than 20%, and 6% said by 50% or more.

    Reworded to match its sources. Dropped unsupported Oct 2026 date, 3+ year residents, and the 3-in-4 strain claim. The 28%, 26%, and 6% figures are supported; electricity is stated. Kept on a lower-weight source; nothing we found says otherwise.

  3. About 1 in 5 respondents said they had cut back on groceries or switched to less expensive food, or looked into doing so, and about 1 in 4 reduced heating or cooling to uncomfortable levels (made or considered in the past two years); CR gives no split between did and considered.

  4. Americans with household incomes below $85,000 were more than twice as likely as those with higher incomes to say the increase in bills strained their finances a lot.

    Reworded to match its sources. Dropped unsupported Oct 2026 date. Consumer Reports evidence says incomes below $85,000 were more than twice as likely to say bill increases strained finances a lot. Kept on a lower-weight source; nothing we found says otherwise.

  5. Respondents named utility profits (45%), data center and AI demand (38%), fossil fuel prices (37%) and infrastructure costs (36%) as drivers of their bills; about 3 in 4 trust state regulators only a little or not at all, and just 1% trust them completely.

Show all 38 factsShow fewer facts

  1. CR’s release says: ‘A vast majority of Americans (84%) would support their local electricity utility creating a separate rate category for large users such as data centers’; half said data centers should pay all costs of infrastructure built mainly to serve them.

  2. Sara Enright, CR Senior Director of Safety & Energy, said: ‘Americans are being asked to foot the bill for costs they didn’t create and can’t control.’

  3. NARUC’s ratemaking manual defines the revenue requirement as an authorized (not guaranteed) return on rate base plus O&M, depreciation and taxes, and says the cost allocation among residential, commercial and industrial classes is a zero-sum game: ‘the revenue requirement determines the size of the pie, while the rate design (inter-class) will decide… the slicing of the pie.’

    Kept on a lower-weight source (naruc.org); nothing we found says otherwise.

  4. S&P Global Market Intelligence reported that the average authorized return on equity for electric utility rate cases decided in 2023 was 9.60%, and that electric utilities earned 84 basis points below authorized returns in 2023.

    Kept on a lower-weight source (S&P Global); nothing we found says otherwise.

  5. PJM’s capacity auction cleared at $28.92/MW-day for 2024/25 and $269.92/MW-day for most of the footprint for 2025/26 (BGE and Dominion cleared higher, at $466.35 and $444.26).

  6. PJM’s 2026/27 auction (July 2025) cleared at the FERC-approved cap of $329.17/MW-day across the footprint, and the 2027/28 auction (Dec 17, 2025) cleared at the cap of $333.44/MW-day, up 1.3%, procuring $16.4 billion of supply and falling 6,623 MW short of its reliability requirement.

    Kept on a lower-weight source (power-eng.com); nothing we found says otherwise.

  7. PJM said forecast peak load for 2027/28 was about 5,250 MW higher than the forecast for 2026/27, and ‘Nearly 5,100 MW of that increase is attributable to data center demand.’

  8. The price cap and floor came from a deal announced Jan 28, 2025 between PJM and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro to resolve his complaint over capacity costs.

  9. PJM’s independent market monitor estimates that existing and forecast data center load growth has added more than $23 billion to PJM capacity market costs since 2025.

    Reworded to match its sources. Primary-reason claim and three-auction timing unsupported; sources say "more than $23B" since 2025, while Utility Dive reports $21.3B across three auctions.

  10. The DC Office of People’s Counsel said on May 22, 2025 that roughly half of the projected roughly $20 monthly hike was driven by a spike in PJM capacity prices.

    Kept on a lower-weight source (datacentrecentral.com); nothing we found says otherwise.

  11. IEEFA estimated that capacity market prices would increase the average residential bill by $18 a month in western Maryland and by about $16 a month in Ohio.

    Reworded to match its sources. The figures and attribution are supported: $18/month in western Maryland and about $16/month in Ohio. The evidence is T3 and largely repeats one IEEFA estimate.

  12. Maryland People’s Counsel David Lapp told CNN that of the transmission upgrades PJM proposed to serve data center growth, ‘The majority of those costs will be paid for by all customers even though the costs almost entirely are the result of data center development.’

  13. Maryland’s Office of People’s Counsel filed a FERC complaint on May 7 arguing that PJM rules unlawfully assign Maryland customers $2 billion of $22 billion in data-center-driven transmission costs, which it says will raise Maryland bills by $1.6 billion over ten years.

  14. CenterPoint announced a Customer Savings Initiative offering Texas electric customers, including Greater Houston residential, small and medium business, and commercial customers, the opportunity to save more than $5 billion over the next decade.

    Reworded to match its sources. Added a 14 GW figure and residential-only savings are unsupported. Right: over $5 billion over a decade, spread across residential, business and commercial customers. AEP quote unverified.

  15. A Rutgers Policy Lab study linking 2,277 data centers to a 24-state panel from 2014-2024 found utility-territory effects of about +$0.35 a month (unweighted) and about -$2.00 a month (household-weighted), neither statistically distinguishable from zero; it titled the work ‘Are Data Centers Raising Your Electric Bill? Mostly Not. Yet.’

  16. Latitude Media reported that researchers wrote that if demand fails to materialize, utilities would recover fixed costs across fewer kilowatt-hours, reversing the mechanism that has lowered prices so far.

    Reworded to match its sources. Original credited Latitude Media directly; the evidence shows the researchers wrote this, as quoted by Latitude Media. The quoted claim itself is supported. Kept on a lower-weight source; nothing we found says otherwise.

  17. At a Feb 10, 2026 Wisconsin PSC hearing on We Energies’ proposed 500 MW ‘Very Large Customer’ class, We Energies customer Gloria Randall-Hewitt (spelled Randall-Hwitt in the report) said: ‘We should not be subsidizing corporate infrastructure. The utility must ensure costs are not shifted onto regular customers like me.’

    Kept on a lower-weight source (racinecountyeye.com); nothing we found says otherwise.

  18. At the same hearing, Charles Hasenohrl of Pleasant Prairie said of the 500 MW threshold, ‘That number is ridiculous… It should be no higher than 50 megawatts,’ while Microsoft’s Shelley McKinley supported the new class.

    Kept on a lower-weight source (racinecountyeye.com); nothing we found says otherwise.

  19. Wisconsin regulators later changed We Energies’ data center rate proposal, lowering the large-customer threshold from 500 MW to 100 MW.

  20. Large energy users must pay cash up front for grid equipment built only for them within 60 days of signing their first contract, and must pay at least 75% of their projected electricity demand each month even if they use less.

    Reworded to match its sources. Letters of credit, shrinking collateral, 90% floor and Senate report lack support. Evidence shows upfront cash within 60 days and 75% minimum monthly payment.

  21. On Sept 30, 2026, Sen. Jon Husted’s bill asking regulators to consider a standard charging large customers for the upgrades they require failed in the Senate 57-43 after passing the House 417-3; Schumer called it ‘a fraud, plain and simple,’ and Thune said Democrats should ‘take yes for an answer.’

  22. Reuters reported on Oct 22, 2026 that public opposition to data centers may jolt the AI trade as the midterms approach, with a strong Democratic showing potentially hampering the buildout that has lifted stocks.

  23. In a note dated Oct 23, 2026, BofA Global Research estimated global data center spending at $1 trillion in 2026, more than doubling to $2.1 trillion by 2028, with construction costs of about $49 million per megawatt.

  24. Under the 1980 Northwest Power Act, smelters got long-term BPA contracts and paid a premium that financed the residential exchange; by the end of the 20th century most Northwest smelters were closed or uncertain amid rising power and labor costs.

    Kept on a lower-weight source (nwcouncil.org); nothing we found says otherwise.

  25. BPA proposed idling the region’s 10 aluminum smelters for two years, paying a portion of aluminum workers’ wages and benefits in exchange.

    Reworded to match its sources. The original wrongly says BPA concluded it could save money paying companies. Evidence shows a proposal to idle 10 smelters for two years, paying workers' wages; savings claim is critics' view.

  26. The U.S. Energy Information Administration reported 13.4 million residential electricity disconnections in 2024.

    Reworded to match its sources. The 13.4 million 2024 disconnections figure is supported by EIA. The LIHEAP budget claim has only lower-tier support, and the state protection claim has none, so both are dropped.

  27. In Indiana, anyone can send written comments on a rate case to the state consumer counselor (OUCC), and a public field hearing is required for rate requests over $2.5 million.

  28. Brent crude settled at $116.72 a barrel on Oct 23, 2026, up $3.55 and its highest settlement since April 29, after Houthi attacks across Saudi Arabia; WTI settled at $103.27.

  29. Freddie Mac said on Oct 22, 2026 that the 30-year fixed mortgage averaged 7.32%, down from 7.40% the week before and up from 6.19% a year earlier.

  30. The University of Michigan’s final October consumer sentiment reading, released Oct 23, 2026, was 48.0, a five-month low, with year-ahead inflation expectations at 4.7%, up from 4.6%.

    Reworded to match its sources. Source corrected: the page first cited was read and is about something else; the sources listed state this.

  31. On Oct 23, 2026, President Trump modified the 50% tariff on Canadian goods, dropping it on some products such as plywood and seaweed and adding others including wooden coffins and canoes, effective Oct 30.

  32. On Oct 20, 2026, US food importer Gellert Global Group sued in the Court of International Trade, arguing Section 338 doesn’t authorize the 50% Canada tariffs, which it says will cost it about $40 million a year.

    Reworded to match its sources. Source corrected: the page first cited was read and is about something else; the sources listed state this.

  33. Finder’s tracker put the US average gas price at $4.31 a gallon on Oct 22, 2026, down from $4.36 on Oct 15 and 46% above $2.96 on Feb 26, 2026.

Removed during checking (3)

  • Pepco residential customers in DC using 614 kWh a month were projected to see supply charges rise about $20.81 a month, or 17.7%, starting June 2025.

    Why it was removed: Only lower-weight sources state this: GlobeNewswire and 2 more.

  • In December 1939, Bonneville Power Administrator Paul Raver signed a contract with Alcoa for an initial 32.5 average megawatts for a Vancouver smelter after Congress questioned BPA's low revenues; the region's aluminum industry grew to 10 smelters and about 11,000 jobs.

    Why it was removed: Only one source states this: nwcouncil.org.

  • For the week ending Oct 23, 2026, the S&P 500 fell 1% and the Nasdaq lost 2.1%, a second straight weekly loss for both, while gold fell to $3,993.96 an ounce on Oct 23, below $4,000.

    Why it was removed: CNBC states something different: "On the week, the S&P 500 lost 0.5%, and the Nasdaq shed 0.7%. The Dow gained 0.4% in the period.".

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