Source: KCBX | By Kendra Hanna

Mark Toney is the executive director of The Utility Reform Network. He said the new rate is only a little higher than what he had hoped, but that rate decrease is negligible next to the amount spent on expensive projects like PG&E burying their power lines. Toney still expects that customers’ monthly bills will continue to go up.

The commission that regulates California’s utilities just approved a lower investor return rate for the next two years. That can affect costs to customers, but it’s not clear if it will reduce their monthly bills. Pacific Gas and Electric, or PG&E, will have to compensate investors for infrastructure projects at this new, lower rate. It’s now set to just under 10% — lower than what PG&E requested, and the lowest rate since 2006.

Source: The Mercury News | By George Avalos

The Utility Reform Network also disagreed with the decision because the PUC didn’t sufficiently reduce PG&E’s rate of return.  “Revising the decision in favor of utility shareholders is more than just buckling under pressure from PG&E and other major utilities,” TURN Executive Director Mark Toney said. “It is part of a disturbing pattern of commissioners disregarding proposals to address the affordability crisis.” Toney urged state politicians to step in and help utility customers.  “This is a clear sign that the Legislature needs to take more action to address the affordability crisis, because the CPUC has failed to do so,” Toney said.

State regulators Thursday reined in the profit returns that shareholders of PG&E and other utility providers can harvest, a decision that failed to quell a debate over whether customers can easily afford to pay their monthly electric and gas bills.  The state Public Utilities Commission voted 4-1 to approve slightly lower rates of return for shareholders starting in 2026 compared to current levels.

Source: The San Diego Union Tribune | By Rob Nikolewski

“Revising the cost of capital decision in favor of utility shareholders is more than just buckling under pressure from PG&E and other major utilities,” TURN executive director Mark Toney said.  “It is part of a disturbing pattern of commissioners disregarding proposals to address the affordability crisis issued by their own judges and staff, based upon evidence presented by all parties in ratemaking cases. This is a clear sign that the Legislature needs to take more action to address the affordability crisis, because the CPUC has failed to do so."

The California Public Utilities Commission on Thursday trimmed the rates of profit that investor-owned utilities such as San Diego Gas & Electric will make on their energy infrastructure projects — although consumer and environmental groups said the CPUC’s reductions should have cut deeper.  

Source: Politico | By Noah Baustin

Mark Toney, executive director of affordability group The Utility Reform Network, said in an interview that the small drop in the return on equity won’t make up for other major CPUC approvals of capital spending to reduce wildfire risk on the grid, which will have the overall effect of increasing ratepayer costs in the long run. “The CPUC giveth with one hand, they taketh away with another hand, and that’s what’s happening right now,” Toney said, expressing frustration with the agency’s utility-friendly decision on a recent major wildfire resilience investment decision.

THREADING THE NEEDLE: California energy regulators tried hard to capture the in-vogue affordability rhetoric as they marginally cut the profit rate that investor-owned utilities will be allowed to pass onto their shareholders in 2026. But they’re playing to a tough crowd: Everyone from investment bankers to affordability hawks ended up bashing their final decision.  

Source: The Orange County Register | By Teri Sforza

“What the CPUC giveth with one hand, they taketh away with the other,” said Mark Toney, executive director of the consumer advocacy group TURN, The Utility Reform Network.  People pay a lot of attention to the ROE percentages the utilities can collect — ooo! they’re going down! — but that misses the forest for the trees, TURN’s Toney suggested. “When you’re financing a home, you want to know, ‘What’s my monthly payment?’ ” he said. “The two things that impact that are — yes, the interest rate on your mortgage — but, much more importantly, the price of your house.”  In this analogy, the amount of money utilities borrow for capital projects equates to the price of the house. “It’s the same thing with people’s monthly bills. They’re more impacted by how much is being financed,” Toney said. “I get frustrated because there’s so much media on the percentage, while utilities are allowed to bloat their capital costs. So the reduction in the percentage — don’t get me wrong, that’s a good thing — is going to be more than offset by how much is being financed.”

As our electric bills continue their skyward ascent, a question crackles like lightning over regulators’ heads: how much profit should the big utilities be allowed to make? The California Public Utilities Commission wrestled with that lightning on Thursday. In the end, commissioners gave the utilities less than they asked for, and less than they got the year before, but way more than what consumer advocates believe they should get.

Source: Politico | By Noah Austin

That frustrated affordability advocates at The Utility Reform Network. “This is the CPUC caving to the utilities,” said TURN Executive Director Mark Toney in an interview.

California utilities scored a major victory Wednesday to the dismay of affordability advocates, with regulators stripping a key element energy companies disliked from a proposed power line undergrounding program.  

Source: NRDC | By Jordan Brinn

NRDC and The Utility Reform Network submitted an electric rate design proposal to the California Public Utilities Commission to promote equity and encourage beneficial electrification. This is the first stage in a regulatory process to implement income-based fixed charges.  This proposal helped California regulators figure out how to confidently plan and pay for grid upgrades when the future is inherently uncertain, providing other states with a road map. Although the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) gets some things right with this decision, the ways in which it deviates from the NRDC proposal increases the risk of imprudent utility spending.

Planning the electric grid used to be much easier because utilities had a reasonable idea of where electricity demand would grow, when it would grow, and by how much. Electrification, a key strategy to decarbonizing California’s economy, has made distribution grid planning much more complicated because it is now harder to accurately predict how electricity demand will grow and what investments are necessary to support a reliable grid. 

Source: KQED | By Laura Klivans

There are real barriers to seeking help for high utility bills, said Constance Slider Pierre, who oversees The Utility Reform Network’s consumer hotline. Barriers include speaking limited English, confusion over how to read bills, and difficulty reaching customer service representatives, Slider Pierre said.  

For three days last December, when Kenya Brown’s youngest four kids weren’t in school, they spent their time at her oldest son’s apartment. They did their homework, charged their phones, showered and had dinner.  The children returned to the family home only to sleep;the house was dark and cold. Their utilities had been shut off — no heat, no lights, no hot water, no gas for cooking; Brown hadn’t paid the bill in months.  Brown’s bills are like many others in California: high, especially in recent years. 

Source: CalMatters Live | By Alejandro Lazo

Mark: “TURN is a consumer advocacy organization that fights for the customers of the investor-owned utilities.  We believe in the cleanest, safest energy at the most affordable price so we say we want the most green for the least green.  One of our major concerns is the affordability crisis and PG&E’s residential bills have doubled in five years.  We want to make sure that with this affordability crisis that the growth of data centers doesn’t end up with even more skyrocketing bills.  There certainly needs to be more transparency when it comes to data center energy usage.

As California races to break its dependence on fossil fuels and expand clean energy, a new power player is emerging: data centers. Driven by the explosive growth of artificial intelligence, these energy-hungry facilities are reshaping the state’s electricity landscape. 

Source: ABC7 KGO-TV | By Dustn Dorsey

But Lee Trotman, Community Director at The Utility Reform Network (TURN) says that burying the lines is the most expensive option, and that other less expensive options such as covered conductors and insulating wires is more cost-effective and also reduces wildfire risk.  Raising rates by using the most expensive option to mitigate wildfire risk is another cost that ratepayers will bear if PG&E has their way.  

According to PG&E, it has buried over 1,000 miles of lines in high risk areas and the plan is to bury 3,000 more.  Claiming that burying the lines almost eliminates the risk of wildfire at a cost of $3 million per mile, PG&E is expected to raise rates to cover these costs.  

Source: The San Diego Union-Tribune | By Rob Nikolewski

“We do think (reducing the return from 10.23% to 9.88% is) a step in the right direction, but so much more needs to be done in terms of affordability,” said Mark Toney, executive director at The Utility Reform Network (TURN),  the Oakland-based organization that frequently weighs in on CPUC matters. TURN called for a return on equity of 9.5% for SDG&E. Toney emphasized that while the percentages that utilities earn are important, another crucial factor is the accumulated costs that power companies spend on expensive projects that get passed to ratepayers. And the the CPUC has final approval on whether those projects get the green light. 

Investor-owned utilities in California — including San Diego Gas & Electric — will earn smaller rates of profit on their infrastructure projects next year under a proposed decision that will soon go before the five voting members of the California Public Utilities Commission.  

In SDG&E’s case, what’s called the utility’s “return on equity” would drop from 10.23% in 2026 to 9.88% under the figures released late last week. It’s difficult to say what the lower rate would mean for the monthly bills that SDG&E customers pay, but the pending vote comes at a time when high rates have become a major concern across California and in the San Diego area in particular.

Source: Fox26 News | By Mayra Franco

Not everyone agrees with PG&E’s optimistic outlook.  Consumer advocates say the rate increase could still hit families hard over time.  Mark Toney, with The Utility Reform Network said, "In the past six or seven years, PG&E bills have already doubled. They've already gone up 100%.” He adds," This rate case is not just about 2027. It's about 27, 28, 29, and 30. At the end of 2030, if this is approved, the bills will be $42 a month higher or $500 a year higher.”  Toney urges residents to attend the hearings saying, "It is incredibly important for you to show up and say, no on this rate increase."

PG&E is giving customers a chance to weigh in on its latest proposal to raise electricity rates by 3.6%, but the company says you might not even notice the change.  State rules require PG&E to file a General Rate Case every four years. This process determines how much customers will pay on their bills over the next several years. The company submitted it to CPUC back in May.  For the first time in a while, customers can speak directly to PG&E about the proposed changes. 

Source: Canary Media Live Berkeley | By Julian Spector

Mark: I really appreciate being invited by Canary Media and being part of this conversation.  TURN fights for the cleanest energy at the lowest prices.  I like to say we want the most green for the least green and this is important because affordability and clean energy  need to go hand in hand.  We have to resist the people that want to split them apart and say “you either have to choose affordable and dirty or clean and expensive" and at TURN we reject that.  We fight for clean and affordable together!  These are absolutely some of the most trying times that many of us have seen in our lifetimes when it comes to all the attacks on clean energy policies.  When it comes to utility bills skyrocketing, and yet there is and are many glimmers of hope.

Canary Media is a nonprofit news organization focusing on the transition to clean energy and climate challenges.  On November 6th 2025 the Canary Media Live event in Berkeley was streamed live and Executive Director of TURN Mark Toney was interviewed by host Julian Spector.

Source: Bay Area News Group | By George Avalos

PG&E’s electricity and data center plans have been met with skepticism by The Utility Reform Network, a consumer group also known as TURN.  “TURN is very concerned about data centers driving up electric rates for Californians,” said Mark Toney, TURN’s executive director. “It’s essential that those costs are recovered fairly and don’t cause electric rates to increase for households who are already struggling to pay their utility bills.”

PG&E is focusing expansion and upgrade plans in the San Jose area as officials predict the South Bay’s need for electricity will far outstrip a projected jump in demand within its service territory, the investor-owned utility’s chief executive said in a wide-ranging interview.  For PG&E, San Jose offers a confluence of land and demand. The city has plenty of available open space for a tech industry whose thirst for energy has soared.

Source: Lifeline with Craig Roberts | By Craig Roberts, iHeart Radio Network

"PG&E is not even feigning embarrassment and coming straight for a 24.5% rate increase over the next five years.  Add that to what we went through over the last 21 months and it becomes a big ouch for every ratepayer’s pocketbook.  Joining me today in the studio is our friend, Executive Director of The Utility Reform Network or TURN, Mark Toney.” “What PG&E is asking for over the next four years is for your annual gas and electric bill to go up by $500 a year, $42 a month is what they’re requesting.   After all these rate increases we have had over the past few years, that is going to hurt a LOT of people” Mark Toney said. “Mark, when we include the price we pay at the pump, the price we pay at the grocery store, if you’re a homeowner did you just receive your tax bill, funny how Prop 13 limits property tax increases but at the end of the day, these customers for these rate increases might have to say ‘I don’t have it.'  Now what you’re asking me to do is to decide if I stop eating meat altogether, or choose which medications I need to have.” “I have more unwelcome news—only 50% of PG&E’s increases are within this general rate case request.  PG&# has another 10 rate increase proposals right now pending with the  Public Utilities Commission,  so each one of those is going to get stacked on top of this.  So we’re not just looking at $500 a year, we could be looking at closer to $1000 a year by the time we get to 2030.  Everybody, Craig, is looking at huge rate increases."

Source: GV Wire | By Bill McEwen

A nonprofit watchdog, The Utility Reform Network, said the new law is a win for consumers.  “California residents are facing an unprecedented affordability crisis, and AB 1167 goes a long way to holding for-profit utility companies accountable to spending ratepayer money to benefit customers, not to fill shareholder pockets. We thank Governor Newsom for his leadership and look forward to continuing to work with him to achieve utility affordability and accountability,” said Mark Toney, executive director of TURN.

After decades of taking it on the chin from public utility companies like PG&E and Southern California Edison, ratepayers scored a victory this legislative season.  On Saturday, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill 1167, which ends using ratepayer funds for political lobbying, promotion, and other shareholder expenses. The new law also beefs up enforcement against investor-owned utilities that illegally spend ratepayer monies. The California Ratepayer Protection Act goes into effect on Jan. 1, 2026.  Media investigations into California’s monopoly utilities have revealed use of ratepayer funds to cover millions of dollars in inappropriate expenses.

Source: Bay Area News Group | By George Avalos

Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Wednesday that customers of PG&E and other utilities would see a climate credit on their October bills as part of a decade-old state program. At least one consumer group stressed it’s still not enough to lessen the impact of high electricity costs. The October refunds are part of a California Climate Credit effort that began in 2015. The credits appear twice a year on state utility bills – once in April and once in October.

While the twice-a-year credits offer a welcome relief to elevated costs in California, the reductions don’t address the fundamental challenges of expensive utility rates, said Mark Toney, executive director of The Utility Reform Network, also known as TURN.  “These are refunds,” Toney said. “They don’t address electricity rates. “Any relief is great, but the rebates don’t address the fundamental problem of affordable electricity bills."

Source: Politico | By Noah Baustin

“So much more still needs to be done,” said Mark Toney, executive director of The Utility Reform Network, a customer advocacy group. “There are contributions that are on [the governor’s] desk now and there is more to be done next year.”

NOBODY’S SINGING YET: You’d be excused for thinking that the energy affordability lawmaking was done for the year after Gov. Gavin Newsom and legislative leadership celebrated the signing of their landmark energy affordability package in high style last week. You’d also be wrong.

Source: Canary Media | By Jeff St. John

“We’re strongly opposed,” said Matthew Freedman, staff attorney at The Utility Reform Network (TURN). Previous versions of the bill ​“had a bunch of provisions we thought would have protected California’s sovereignty and prevented the federal government from weaponizing its authority. Most of those protections were stripped from the bill, inexplicably.”  In particular, in May, TURN and its allies pushed to add an amendment that would have created an oversight council including California lawmakers that would have had the authority to pull the state out of the market if they determined it would raise energy costs or work against the state’s carbon-emissions goals.

After years of failed attempts, California lawmakers have cleared the way to create an electricity-trading market that would stretch across the U.S. West. Advocates say that could cut the region’s power costs by billions of dollars and support the growth of renewable energy. But opponents say it may make the state’s climate and clean-energy policies vulnerable to the Trump administration.

Source: The Los Angeles Times | By Sammy Roth

But under SB 254, shareholders of Edison, PG&E and SDG&E won’t earn a dime on the next $6 billion the utilities spend to reduce the risk of wildfire ignitions from their infrastructure, starting in 2026. That could save customers $3 billion over 10 years, according to the Utility Reform Network, a ratepayer watchdog group.  SB 254 also lays the groundwork for government loans to fund construction of some new power lines. That would be less expensive than utility funding, because ratepayers wouldn’t need to cover shareholder profits.

Last month, I wrote that California is backsliding on climate, and that it’s mostly Gov. Gavin Newsom’s fault. I took him and his appointees to task for undermining rooftop solar, propping up the Aliso Canyon gas field and slowing implementation of a single-use plastics recycling law, among other offenses.  So, it’s only fair that I give him credit for his actions last week, at the close of the legislative session. Legislators passed several bills meant to help reduce the cost of electricity — a top priority for lawmakers looking to tackle the state’s high cost of living, and also a smart move for climate progress. People are more likely to drive electric cars, and install electric heat pumps to warm and cool their homes, if electricity is less expensive.