Pennsylvania homeowners are paying on average 20% more than they were just two years ago to power their homes, according to the state’s Independent Fiscal Office.
The typical monthly electric bill increased from $213 in 2024 to $232 in 2025. This year the average bill is $257 per month, which includes generation, transmission, distribution and other costs, including taxes, according to the IFO report.
The report shows generation and transmission costs per kilowatt hour increased 12% when utility companies published their “price to compare” cost in June. Price-to-compare, or PTC, is the default service rate for a six-month period, in this case June through November. That’s what you would pay if you didn’t shop for a different supplier.
The price per kilowatt hour for June through November 2025 was 11.27 cents, compared to 12.61 cents for the current period.
Utilities, suppliers also paying higher costs
The increase in residential rates correlates with even larger increases in wholesale prices in the power grid. The wholesale price is what utility companies and retail electricity suppliers pay to buy power from the power grid, which is operated by PJM Interconnection LLC. Wholesale prices are what these companies pay to supply power to not only retail customers, but all customers, including business and industries.
Wholesale prices were $55.5 per megawatt hour in 2024 and then jumped 48.3% to $82.30 in 2025.
In the first quarter of 2026? The wholesale price per megawatt hour was $136.5, a 75.5% hike from the first quarter of 2025, when the price was $78 per megawatt hour.
“The data show that wholesale price gains have been driven by energy and, to a lesser extent, capacity costs,” the IFO reported. “Capacity reflects the costs associated with PJM capacity auctions, which have increased dramatically as regional demand is projected to outpace supply.”
PJM Interconnection is the grid for 13 states and the District of Columbia.
In a May 26 report for the first quarter of 2026, the independent Monitoring Analytics LLC attributed the large jump in wholesale prices to several factors, from transmission limitations to higher fuel prices and a surge in demand from data centers.
Electricity costs in Pa. are outpacing inflation
So how does the rising cost of electricity compare to the rate of inflation?
The Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that between June 2022 and June 2026, the consumer price index rose 19% in the Pittsburgh region and just over 16% in the Philadelphia region. During the same time period, a typical household is now paying an additional $66, or 35% more, than what they were paying for power four years ago.
