Why Maryland’s Power Bills Are Rising — and What We Can Do About It
Why Maryland’s Power Bills Are Rising — and What We Can Do About It
In case you missed our recent Conservation Conversation, here are the key insights from energy experts on what’s driving up your electricity costs and how clean energy solutions could help.
If you’ve noticed your electricity bills creeping higher, you’re not alone. Maryland families are facing significant rate increases, particularly BGE customers who could see bills jump by around $21 per month (about $250 per year) starting in June 2025. But, contrary to what some may claim, clean energy isn’t the culprit, but is actually part of the solution.
During our recent Conservation Conversation, we heard from energy experts Claire Wayner from RMI’s Carbon-Free Electricity program and Greg Poulos from Consumer Advocates of the PJM States about what’s really driving these rate increases and what Marylanders can do about it.
What are the Factors?
As Claire explained, we’re experiencing a perfect storm of factors that are affecting electricity prices across our region. Your electricity bill has several components, and multiple pieces are driving costs up simultaneously:
- Energy Prices: The day-to-day costs of electricity generation are rising due to high natural gas prices driven by inflation and international supply disruptions.
- Capacity Charges: We pay extra to ensure electricity is “on call” during peak demand periods (like the extreme heat we’re experiencing). These prices are determined by supply and demand — and right now we’re seeing more demand (from data centers and load growth) but less supply due to power plant retirements and delays in connecting new clean energy projects to the grid.
- Transmission Costs: Investment in high-voltage power lines has increased significantly, but without sufficient oversight at state, regional, and federal levels.
- Distribution: The local poles and wires that deliver electricity to your home. Maryland’s use of multi-year rate plans has allowed utilities to increase these distribution costs with less regulatory oversight than traditional annual rate reviews.
The Clean Energy Bottleneck
Here’s the irony: we have hundreds of clean energy projects waiting in PJM’s interconnection queue to connect to the grid, but they’re facing delays. As Claire pointed out, PJM has been “used to the bigger resources for decades” and has struggled to process the many smaller renewable energy applications efficiently.
Meanwhile, during the recent extreme heat, Greg noted that only about 5% of electricity was coming from renewable resources, most of which is solar. “The renewable resources are not a big part of the markets or the resources relied on at this point,” he explained, “but hopefully they will be because we need all the above.”
The Capacity Market Challenge
A key driver of the rate increases is PJM’s capacity market, where prices jumped, as Greg noted, 421% for the delivery year starting June 2025. This increase stems from power plant retirements combined with new demand forecasts and PJM’s decisions to require higher reserve margins and more stringent requirements on energy generators.
As Greg explained, the problem is timing: “You really need three to five years if not more to develop” new resources, but PJM’s recent auctions have compressed timelines to just six months or a year, making it nearly impossible for new projects to respond to price signals.
Clean Energy: The Solution, Not the Problem
The data presented makes clear that renewable energy sources offer stable, cost-effective power once they are online. Unlike fossil fuel plants that face volatile fuel costs and startup expenses, wind and solar have no fuel costs after they are built.
The challenge isn’t too much clean energy, but getting clean energy projects through the approval process and connected to the grid fast enough to meet growing demand.
What You Can Do
In Your Home:
- Take advantage of Maryland’s EmPOWER program for energy efficiency upgrades
- Consider signing up for demand response programs with your utility company that alert you to high-demand periods when reducing usage saves the most money
- Look into community solar for more stable pricing
- Switch to a heat pump to shield yourself from natural gas price spikes, especially for winter heating
- Utilize smart thermostats and load flexibility options when available
For Policy Change:
- Contact your state legislators about PJM market reforms and supporting grid enhancing technologies that maximize our existing grid infrastructure
- Reach out to the Maryland Public Service Commission and the Office of People’s Counsel (Maryland’s consumer advocate)
- Support clean energy projects in your community as they seek local and state permits
- Join the Offshore Wind Alliance and sign the “Yes to Wind” petition to show public support for these critical projects
- Contact the Governor’s office — as Greg noted, “PJM has been very much listening to the governors and the concerns that they have provided”
The Path Forward
Maryland’s energy challenges require both immediate action and long-term planning. We need to get more clean energy projects through the interconnection queue, build the transmission infrastructure to support them, and implement policies that encourage load flexibility and efficiency.
As Claire emphasized, “One of the key solutions to bringing prices down is going to be getting more projects through that interconnection queue, getting more supply onto the grid, and building more clean energy.”
The solutions exist, from offshore wind that can provide reliable power even on hot, still days to battery storage that can help balance supply and demand. What we need now is the political will to implement them at the scale and speed our communities deserve.
Want to learn more? Watch the full Conservation Conversation on our YouTube channel and sign up for our email list to stay updated on Maryland’s energy policy developments.
In Ocean City, does criticism of offshore wind hold water?
This editorial was originally published in The Baltimore Sun
At the Roland E. Powell Convention Center in Ocean City, local officials have posted a sign: “SAVE THE OCEAN. STOP THE TURBINES.” It’s not subtle. And while it’s possible that some passersby will have no idea what those “TURBINES” are about or how they threaten the ocean, it’s clear everyone in elected office sure does. Their anger is directed at the proposed US Wind offshore wind farm more than 10 miles offshore. Last week, the Maryland Department of the Environment approved an air quality permit for the project, the last major hurdle, at least on the state level, for as many as 114 turbines to be built off the Maryland and Delaware coast generating enough electricity to power 718,000 homes.
One might think that clean energy would be especially appealing to a community that stakes its livelihood on sand and surf and where rising sea levels pose an especially grave danger. But, no, not at all. Elected officials are universally up in arms including their condemnation of the MDE permit. A “poorly conceived and potentially disastrous offshore wind project” was how Mayor Richard W. Meehan described it, adding that the resort town and its economy “will be significantly impacted if hundreds of these giant eyesores are constructed 10 miles from our beaches.”
Meehan and others have a laundry list of objections including concerns over the impact to wildlife (a claim that’s not especially well supported by research) but his use of the term “eyesore” is telling. What he and many others in Ocean City worry about is what they have called the “viewshed,” how the tall windmills will look from the beach. Their chief concern is that they will depress property values. Their theory is that visitors will be turned off by their presence even if the closest they come is roughly the distance between Catonsville and Pikesville.
“As more and more Marylanders learn the true costs and negative impacts of the industrialization of our ocean, the Stop Offshore Wind movement continues to grow each day,” writes State Sen. Mary Beth Carozza, an Ocean City native. And while it’s fair to be concerned about some aspects of the project’s development — how to properly dispose of used turbine blades made of fiberglass and epoxy resin, for example — it’s not as if Senator Carozza and other opponents are seeking to limit far-worse-polluting coal-powered generating plants or even to promote energy efficiency. They just don’t like the looks of wind turbines, distant or not.
But even that opposition is not well supported by experience. The presence of offshore wind turbines has not proved to be a drag on land values in places like the Block Island Wind Farm in Rhode Island or the Nysted and Rønland wind farms off the coast of Denmark — and all of these existing turbines are located closer to land than the Ocean City project. Indeed, taking a tour boat out to see the Block Island turbines up close is a popular tourist activity. And since when has Ocean City become overly concerned about appearances? This is, after all, a town that’s not exactly been strict on developers or business owners. The Ocean City Council has only recently been considering an ordinance restricting boardwalk sales of T-shirts and other goods with sexually explicit images or vulgar and profane messages.
We appreciate how Ocean City’s residents feel like their concerns haven’t been heard. That’s not an uncommon response in the rural parts of Maryland. And it probably doesn’t help that President Donald Trump is a vocal opponent of wind energy — on land or water. Whether his opposition will stop the US Wind project remains unclear, as the project was approved by the U.S. Department of Interior when President Joe Biden was still in office last fall. But even on the politically conservative Eastern Shore, a February poll by Gonzales Research found a majority favor offshore wind and moving away from fossil fuels.
Given all that, it’s about time OC leaders heard from Marylanders who support clean energy and recognize that going green is a selling point, not a turnoff, for vacationers. Perhaps visitors this summer might even drop a note to the City Council and tell them they’ve got windmills on their minds — and wouldn’t mind a little less coal-fired power plant-produced sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, particulate matter and heavy metals in their lungs.
Maryland Voters Support Action on Climate and Transportation
A recent poll — conducted for the Maryland League of Conservation Voters (LCV) by Nexus Polling and the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication — finds strong support for policies to improve transportation and address climate change in the state. The representative survey of 553 registered Maryland voters was conducted January 27-February 4, 2021, and has a margin of error of +/- 4.5%
Voters want the MTA to ensure Marylanders can get to work safely, reduce traffic congestion, reduce pollution, and increase transportation.
Nearly all (96%) Maryland voters say ensuring Marylanders, including essential workers, can get to work safely and on time is an important objective, including more than seven in 10 (72%) who say it is a very important objective. About six in 10 Maryland voters say reducing traffic congestion (61%), reducing the harmful pollution that lowers air quality and contributes to asthma and lung disease (60%), and ensuring low-income communities and communities of color have increased access to public transportation (59%) are very important objectives for MTA. Roughly half say lowering costs for Marylanders (49%) or adding new bus routes and train lines to reach rural communities (48%) are very important objectives as well.
Maryland voters support transit infrastructure spending now.
Nearly two-thirds (66%) of Maryland voters say Maryland should increase spending on transit infrastructure now to ensure Maryland residents, including essential workers, can get around the state safely, while also providing emergency relief to families, businesses, and public services. Majorities of Maryland voters also support a variety of transportation investments, including:
- Investing in repairing and maintaining current transportation infrastructure (86%)
- Adding new bus routes and train lines to reach communities that don’t currently have access to public transportation (83%)
- Providing tax credits or rebates to individuals/households that purchase an electric vehicle (70%)
- Adding bike lanes to existing roads and bridges (70%)
- Investing state tax dollars in installing electric vehicle charging stations in rural, urban, suburban areas (68%)
- Establishing zero-emission zones in cities (52%)
Maryland voters also support a wide array of climate policies, including:
- Planting 4.5 million new trees over the next nine years to help remove carbon pollution from the air (86%)
- Requiring oil and gas companies in the state to pay some of the costs related to adapting to climate change, including investments in transportation infrastructure and sea level rise (76%)
- Requiring fossil fuel companies to pay a fee on their carbon pollution (74%)
- Requiring new constructed buildings with at least 20,000 square feet to install rooftop solar panels (74%)
- Requiring utility companies in Maryland to generate 100% of their electricity from renewable sources by 2030 (72%)
- Replacing state-owned gas- and diesel-powered vehicles with electric or hybrid vehicles (67%)
- Requiring newly constructed homes and buildings to be emissions-free (66%)
Coronavirus response, infrastructure funding and climate action are seen as top priorities for Maryland this year.
More than eight in 10 Maryland voters say passing economic stimulus legislation (83%) and public health legislation (81%) in response to the coronavirus pandemic are important priorities for the Maryland state government this year, including more than six in 10 (61% and 61%, respectively) who say they should be top priorities. Transportation infrastructure is also seen as a high priority by voters in the state: About eight in 10 also say investing more in transportation infrastructure such as roads and bridges (83%) and passing an infrastructure spending bill to update and modernize Maryland’s infrastructure (78%) should be priorities. Roughly seven in 10 see addressing racism (73%) and passing a comprehensive bill to address climate change (69%) as important priorities for the state this year. And 72% of respondents said they support requiring utility companies in Maryland to generate 100% of their electricity from renewable sources by 2030.
Not only do Maryland voters support climate policies, but they want their elected representatives to support them as well.
At least seven in 10 say they would be more likely to vote for a candidate for Maryland political office who backs investing state dollars to upgrade the electric grid and expand the production of renewable energy (73%), requiring fossil fuel companies to pay a tax on their carbon pollution (71%), and reducing greenhouse gas emissions 60% from 2006 levels by 2030 (70%).
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