Salt River Project customers will get a break on their electricity bills the rest of this summer. This week, the utility decided to scale back rates thanks to some unexpected cost savings.
On average, customers will see about 4 percent shaved off their power bills in July and August. That amounts to an overall saving of about $15 – a discount especially welcome given the cost of keeping homes cool during those two months.
The reduction comes after SRP found it was actually cheaper to run its power plants than previously anticipated. SRP’s Jeff Lane said that’s mostly because of market prices for natural gas.
“That fuel is so inexpensive right now that rather than running some of our coal units in the spring, we were able to run natural gas plants with a lower fuel cost,” he said.
Plus SRP was able to purchase energy from renewable sources at a lower cost, Lane said.
Altogether, the utility saved about $27 million. The rates will return to normal in September.
