a plan to change how any energy calculates your power bill is now on hold until January 1st.

The delay comes as confusion grows over why the rates are changing and what it means for customers here.

To break it down is Emerson Druce, business reporter for the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

Emerson, welcome.

Thank you so much for having me.

So before we attempt to explain how this new charge would work, will you tell our viewers why its implementation was pushed back to January of 2027?

Well, I think the reason it's implementation was pushed back is the same reason that I'm here today.

Customers are very confused.

and a lot of people have many questions.

It feels like I'm just constantly being bombarded by my family and friends asking me about it.

So what this is going to be doing is charging you based on two prongs.

So they see three prongs to introduce the basic service charge.

So you have to pay which is 1850 but it's two prongs.

So it's going to be per kilowatt hours and per kilowatt which is what the demand charges.

So in your house you have an energy meter.

And it measures energy based off of 15 minutes per day.

It can only measure it based off of every 15 minutes.

Some do 30 minutes in Nevada here it's every 15 minutes.

So let's say you come home from around five, you come home, you go take a shower.

You blow dry your hair, plug in your blow dryer, then you go start the dishwasher.

You start the microwave and you start your you put in a load of laundry and you start your dryer.

So within a certain 15 minutes, your usage is going to go up the amount of kilowatts you just use, not per kilowatt hour is the amount of kilowatts you just use goes up.

Now for this demonstration I'm just going to say you use let's say you use two kilowatts within that 15 minutes.

What actually is going to happen is they're going to use the demand rate, which is going to be now $0.14.

two times 14 equals $0.28.

Now that is your daily demand charge for let's say that's January 1st.

The very first day of the demand charge is implemented January 2nd.

You might use three kilowatts within your highest 15 minutes.

January 3rd, you might use four kilowatts.

And then January 4th, you might use, let's say goes back down to one kilowatt.

All of those cents are going to be added up, and that's what will be added to the end of your bill.

So and then obviously you'll have you will still have your per kilowatt hour charge.

Now, right now it's at around like the eight $0.09.

It should be going down to around $0.07 to make up for the new demand charge.

And the energy says that this is a way for customers to be able to space out their energy usage and give them more control over their bill.

I believe they are rolling out some kind of demonstrative tool for customers to use, where they can put in their energy bill now and then calculate it for what their energy bill will be with the demand charge.

I mean, they have.

That's exactly what I was looking for on their website.

But here you are explaining it instead of envy.

Energy has envy energy confirmed that this is how it will work?

No, I'm very confident in my explanation.

I've spoken to many people on record, off record about this and there are some other websites that explain this the exact same way as me.

Demand charges are not new for industrial and large commercial customers like casinos have been paying demand charges, but this will be new for small business or small commercial customers and residential customers.

If casinos are already utilizing it, one might think, hey, this is probably in their best interest.

They'll get a better a lower cost, which and the energy says, yes, this is going to not impact non solar customers at all, but if anything it will lower their bill but it will impact solar customers.

Yes.

How so.

Typically solar customers I mean the big draw for people to get solar, even though you might have a $15,000 loan you have to pay back, is that you will have essentially $0 on your utility bill, or you might pay $1, or you might pay $2.

And that's specifically because of net energy metering credits.

So the sun goes on to your solar panels, generates energy for your house, and whatever energy your household doesn't use gets sent back to the grid for then other customers to use, and then you are then reimbursed using the energy metering credits, which then shows up on your bill.

So it will offset the cost of energy that you are using throughout the day.

What the demand charge will do is it will not allow net energy meeting net energy metering credits to be used on the bill to offset, the costs, the amount of energy that you are sending back.

So They will have to pay the mandatory daily demand charge.

They cannot get any kind of credits back for the amount of energy that they send back to the grid.

And so we have heard from solar customers about the potential impact of this on them.

We have some sound bites from some solar customers who spoke at a meeting in October against these changes, and then someone who spoke in favor of them.

Let's listen to it now.

We recently, install solar panel because we start, driving electric vehicle.

So we try to reduce like to be more environmental friendly.

But then when you charge to EV, it's about seven eight kilowatt hour.

So that means we get punished it driving AEP.

So this the main charges of punishing people try to be environmentally friendly.

It is clear to those of us who prudently planned ahead for our retirement years by installing solar, now being punished by you and NV energy, changing the rules and finding a different method to get back at us.

The demand charge helps ensure steady investment and upgrades, maintenance and modernization of work.

The kind of work that keeps our grids strong and our continuous communities powered.

So the last person that we heard from in that clip was IBEW 396.

That's a local union representing skilled electrical workers.

Are there other unions supporting this that you have come in contact with?

And can you give us some insight into why this union would be supporting it?

I haven't seen other unions, not that they don't exist, but I can definitely see why IBEW would be in support of this.

Unions are obviously very pro-worker.

So obviously they want to be rallying for their workers to have reliable jobs, save jobs and well-paying jobs for them to be able to support their family and then support the wider economy.

It makes a lot of sense for them.

Grids do need 24 seven maintenance and 24 seven oversight for them to be cleaned so that sun can go on them constantly and so that you can get the best energy as possible.

It does make a lot of sense because they want to constantly be supporting their workers as well as supporting their craft.

They don't want their craft to be, you know, diminished because of poor maintenance.

And so why does envy energy say this change is necessary then?

it is because of solar.

So they say that the main reason this is necessary is because they've lost around.

I believe it was $400 million from 2019 to 2024 and serving solar customers.

So when you get solar panels, you're not buying them from Envy Energy.

You're probably buying them from a 17 year old door to door solar salesman, and then you're paying that loan off with them.

You're not paying any kind of loan off at the end of the energy for your solar panels.

So they aren't making much money off of solar customers because you're not buying the solar panels from them.

And they're getting that energy metering credits.

So they're not no one's paying their utility bill from solar customers.

So that's not to say that solar customers don't pay a utility bill, but that is the main draw, as you can get a pretty large discount.

And so when the energy says it needs to have some more funding from solar customers in order to maintain that grid, right?

Yes, ma'am.

Okay.

Well, to be continued.

Emerson Prince with the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

Thank you so much for joining us.

Thank you.

We move now to no taxes on tips of federal policies set to make a significant impact in Nevada.

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