Maine regulators approved a rate increase for Emera Maine Tuesday morning, but less than the utility originally requested.
The Maine Public Utilities Commission’s chairman and two commissioners said the distribution portion of a customer’s bill could be raised 5.34 percent, or a total of $4.48 million in revenue across all customers, as of July 1, 2018. Emera had originally asked for a 12 percent increase, or $10 million across all customers. The distribution part of the bill is the cost to get electricity to consumers.
“Most of the difference between the request and what was granted is because of the tax cut act,” said Judy Long, spokeswoman for Emera.
She was referring to the federal Tax Cuts and Jobs Act that took effect January and created a different interest rate for corporations. That change caused Emera’s service costs to decline. The tax act was passed after Emera’s initial rate filing in October 2017.
To read the rest of “Regulators approve rate increase for Emera Maine customers,” an article by contributing Bangor Daily News staff writer Lori Valigra, please follow this link to the BDN online.
