The Indiana Office of Utility Consumer Counselor and the Citizen’s Action Coalition both said a settlement plan over electricity rates between AES Indiana, the city and numerous large businesses was not acceptable.
BlackRock’s interest in AES represents a growing trend of private equity firms investing in, or buying outright, public utility companies as artificial intelligence fuels increasing electricity demands.
The newly appointed Indiana Utility Consumer Counselor didn’t stop there—the office also recommended a multimillion-dollar reduction of the utility’s current base rate.
The Indiana Court of Appeals overturned an Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission decision allowing Duke Energy to raise utility rates on Hoosiers, with the court ruling the utility couldn’t retroactively recover the money it lost due to a federally mandated cleanup of toxic coal ash.
If the proposed increases are approved, customers will see a 7.2% hike in the second quarter of 2026 and then about a 6% increase in January 2027. Those are on top of a 6% increase for previously approved projects in 2026.
The legislation would add a new permitting process for utility developers looking to move large amounts of water to support their projects.
Supporters hold up nuclear power as more efficient and cleaner, but say the cost to get that power connected to Indiana’s grid is too great to be borne by utility companies alone.
Customers will see a rate increase of about 5.4% between 2026 and 2031 if Duke receives approval to add to electricity rates over time rather than at once.
The Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission, or IURC, gave approval for an increase of $395.7 million a year for rates and charges, down from the $491.5 million hike requested by Duke—a decrease of 19.5%.
Ryan Heater has served as the IURC’s staff chief since 2019, but he’ll soon head to Indiana Electric Cooperatives to be the group’s vice president of government relations.
State and not-for-profit utility consumer advocates filed a joint petition on July 11 asking the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission to investigate the utility’s “practices and procedures for storm outage restoration.”
State and not-for-profit utility consumer advocates have asked state regulators to investigate the utlity after a recent storm left some customers without power for nearly a week.
Indianapolis-based utility AES Indiana has agreed to reduce the amount it will charge customers for costs related to the breakdown of its newest power plant from $71 million to $13.7 million under a settlement agreement approved Wednesday by state regulators.
The utility is asking for permission to pass on the cost of power it had to purchase from the grid during the outage, but customers are objecting.
Merrillville, Indiana-based Northern Indiana Public Service Co. asked the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission this week to approve the rate increase over two years for its 470,000 customers across 32 northern Indiana counties.
David Veleta succeeds David Ober, who resigned as commissioner in June after being named vice president of taxation and public finance for the Indiana Chamber of Commerce.
The Indiana Chamber of Commerce said David Ober will start his new position as vice president of taxation and public finance in late June.
Citizens Energy Group announced Wednesday that it wants to acquire a small, little-known political subdivision in Marion County that was months away from starting construction of its own wastewater treatment plant to avoid Citizens’ rate hikes.
Duke Energy won’t be allowed to make its customers pay the more than $210 million needed to recoup coal-ash cleanup costs after the utility failed to follow the proper steps to recover those expenses, the Indiana Supreme Court ruled.
State regulators have approved a settlement with Indiana Michigan Power under which the utility will cut its Indiana residential customers’ base electric rates nearly 6% by next year.
