Electric Bills are Bonkers. What Can We Do About It?

Climate One

News, Social Sciences, News Commentary, Science, Earth Sciences

4.7 • 583 Ratings

🗓️ 27 February 2026

⏱️ 61 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Rising electricity rates across the country are adding pressure to families and businesses already dealing with inflation in other aspects of their lives. Most Americans get their power from a utility that needs to turn a profit for its investors. And people are fed up with the status quo. “Across the country, the utilities have just gotten greedy and are asking for more than they need,” says Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes. Some communities are considering cutting out the profit motive for utilities, taking on the complicated and expensive prospect of moving to public power. But switching from an investor-owned utility to public power is an uphill battle. What are other strategies for reining in corporate greed and making electricity more affordable? Episode Guests: Kris Mayes, Arizona Attorney General Naveena Sadasivam, Investigative Reporter and Editor, Grist Carroll Fife, Councilmember, District 3, Oakland, California Jackson Kaspari, Director of Member Services, Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire For show notes, transcript, and related links, visit https://www.climateone.org/podcasts Skill Up for Earth: ⁠https://skillup.earth⁠ 04:00 – Naveena Sadasivam breaks down electric bill drivers by region 14:00 – High bills affected outcome of Georgia Public Utility Commission 17:00 – Tucson town hall held by AZ AG Kris Mayes to discuss power bill 19:00 – Mayes explains why she’s intervening in rate cases 27:00 – Imbalance of power between utility companies and PUCs and consumer advocates 33:00 – Would Arizona legislators consider allowing community choice aggregation 36:00 – Carroll Fife on why she supported a state bill to explore other options to power suppliers 43:40 – Jackson Kaspari explains how community choice aggregation works in New Hampshire 48:00 – Utility pushback 54:00 – Kaspari explains how much work it took to set up CCA in New Hampshire 56:30 – Climate One More Thing ********** Support Climate One by going ad-free! By subscribing to Climate One on Patreon, you’ll receive exclusive access to all future episodes free of ads, opportunities to connect with fellow Climate One listeners, and access to the Climate One Discord. Sign up today at patreon.com/ClimateOne. Ad sales by Multitude. Contact them for ad inquiries at multitude.productions/ads Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, Kusha, there's a big storm in New York right now. How's it going?
0:03.7	Yes, I am doing well. Thank you for asking. I have a gripe that I would like to discuss that I think is related to today's episode. Okay.
0:12.6	Okay.
0:13.2	It has been snowing a lot in New York lately. I grew up in New York State throughout the 90s. I can tell you there's a lot of snow. It was colder, but it went over a longer period of time. Now it feels like there's just whiplash. Like two days ago, I was able to walk outside without a coat on. Now I'm looking at my window. It's just white, white because there is so much snow going on.
0:34.8	Whoa. But wait, isn't winter in New York like one of the most magical things?
0:38.9	That's what I hear with the snow and all this stuff. It is. It's great. And here's the other thing.
0:44.0	The snow melts. And Ariana, do you have a dog? I don't right now. Okay. I love dogs. But people,
0:50.6	pick up your dog poop. Because on my street, after it melts, it's just littered with this pet poop.
0:59.6	That's disgusting.
1:00.8	And there's a social contract.
1:02.3	People are not holding their end of the bargain.
1:04.4	And I just see global warming showing up in interesting ways because it's not just about it getting hotter all the time.
1:12.8	It's about these whiplash movements between temperatures and between weather.
1:18.6	So, I don't know, do you experience anything similar in your neck of the woods?
1:22.3	Yeah, I mean, I have a version of that.
1:23.8	There's no snow.
1:24.5	But we've had the warmer weather, the colder weather going back and forth this winter in particular. And the cold days are really nice and feel like it kind of used to be when I was growing up. And the warm days feel like it should be two months from now. You know, it's like you look at the calendar and you can't believe it's 85 and it's February. Yeah. I'm sure that my electricity bill is going to be higher.
1:45.0	Which, dear listener, brings us to today's episode, because guess what it's about?
1:49.0	Ariana.
1:50.0	Electricity bills.
1:51.0	That's right.
1:52.0	I'm Ariana Brocious.
	...

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