PSO Wins Rate Hike from Corporation Commission

Public Service Company of Oklahoma won approval this week from the Oklahoma Corporation Commission to increase its base rate by tens of millions of dollars to customers.

It’s still unclear how much of an increase it will mean for those customers. PSO originally filed a $156 million rate hike request last year, stating it needed to recover $625 million in costs for electrical upgrades.  An administrative law judge at the Corporation Commission recommended the amount be lowered to $81.2 million.

But the commission made adjustments, allowing PSO to recover all costs in an environmental settlement with the EPA over the company’s termination of a coal train. The commission’s approval was not the full 10 percent sought by PSO and amounted to a 9.3 percent return.

Calculations were still underway this week on the final dollar amount of the rate hike.