Overview
- The Oregon Public Utility Commission unanimously approved a new rate schedule for Portland General Electric that raises charges for very large customers by 29.7% and lowers residential bills by about 1.3%.
- The higher rate class applies to developments that use more than 20 megawatts of power, a threshold set by the POWER Act to capture big industrial users such as data centers and crypto miners.
- PUC Chair Letha Tawney said the change is meant to make large users' bills reflect the costs they cause on the grid and to protect other customers from future rate pressure.
- Industry groups representing data center operators have signaled opposition and asked the PUC to reconsider, warning the order could raise operating costs and create uncertainty for new projects.
- The POWER Act, passed in April 2025, codified the policy that investor-owned utilities should allocate grid-upgrade costs to the largest users, a step that could influence how other states handle data center growth and grid planning.