Smart Rates to Ensure Fair Compensation

Rate design—the framework utilities and regulators use to set prices for the reliable provision of electricity and energy services—influences consumption and investment decisions across the full range of resource choices: energy efficiency, demand response, and traditional and distributed generation. Prices must reflect the true economic costs of providing energy services, which reflect other market and non-market values, such as environmental performance, resource capabilities, and fluctuations in supply and demand over time.

We help utility regulators apply well-established principles to design smarter rates that maximize the value of technology innovations, open up new markets, and accommodate the distribution and diversification of customer-sited generation resources.

Our Focus

Our experts help regulators weigh the benefits, costs, and net value of energy system resources on both sides of the meter, and design rate structures that ensure fair compensation for all who provide energy supply and services. As utility regulators apply the principles that have evolved over a century of regulation to local conditions in their jurisdictions, we advise them to ensure forward-looking rates that maximize the value of investment decisions by both the utility and customers and benefit society overall.