New resource provides a roadmap outlining levers, policies, and strategies to tackle utility issues.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, PowerLines released Lowering Utility Bills and Growing the Economy: A Playbook for Governors, a resource that outlines strategic levers, policy pathways, and communications strategies for governors and their staff to lower utility bills and grow the economy.

“Governors have significant influence over how much consumers pay for their utility bills and how utilities spend money,” said Charles Hua, PowerLines Founder and Executive Director. “The decisions they make over the next four years will make or break whether American energy consumers can benefit from a more affordable and reliable grid. Governors have a generational opportunity for leadership on energy issues in front of them.” 

Governors are uniquely positioned to lead on these issues given the influence they have over state legislative agendas, budgets, PUC commissioner selection, and their bully pulpit. PowerLines’ playbook is designed to support governors and their staff by outlining over two dozen ways that states can advance energy affordability and economic development, organized into six policy pathways: 

• Modernizing the utility business model
• Getting more out of the existing grid
• Improving grid planning
• Addressing rising electricity demand from data centers and other large customers
• Providing near-term relief to consumers
• Strengthening utility regulation

Rising utility bills are reaching a crisis point: PowerLines research finds that utilities requested a record $31 billion in rate increases in 2025 and are planning $1.4 trillion in capital expenditures through 2030. More than three-quarters of Americans are now calling for stronger government oversight of utilities. 

Historically, governors have seen their chief responsibility as economic development, but with growing concern over the rising cost of electricity in an era of rising electricity demand, governors are increasingly feeling responsible to meet the demands of energy consumers. If states take critical measures to modernize the century-old utility regulatory system through structural reforms benefiting consumers, states have the opportunity to ensure new sources of electricity demand put downward pressure on fixed system costs, improving both energy affordability and economic development.

EXECUTIVE COMMENTARY

“We can add generation, modernize the grid, support data centers and manufacturing, and grow the economy without asking families to shoulder the bill,” said Neil Chatterjee, former chair of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. “That requires a regulatory system that rewards utilities for getting more out of the infrastructure we already have and makes sure new large loads pay their fair share. Consumers should be at the center of every one of those decisions.” 

“Rising electricity bills have quickly become one of the cornerstone issues governors’ offices are wrestling with across the country,” said Tremaine Phillips, former Michigan Public Service Commissioner and PowerLines Senior Advisor. “As a former state regulator, I know that getting utility regulation right doesn’t just lower bills for families—it’s a competitive advantage for attracting the industrial and business growth every governor wants. This playbook gives them an approachable set of tools to address the affordability crisis while holding utilities accountable for putting customers first.”

“I’ve worked with governors’ offices across the country, and utility affordability is an issue every administration is grappling with,” said David Quam, former Deputy Executive Director of the National Governors Association. “This playbook gives governors and their teams exactly what they need: information and options to get up to speed quickly and take actions that work best for their state.”

“The playbook offers practical solutions to the challenging issue of rising electricity bills,” said Ted Thomas, former Chairman of the Arkansas Public Service Commission and PowerLines Senior Advisor. “These decisions are made across multiple parts of state government — a governor’s office, a legislature, a commission — not just the regulator’s desk. Having served in all three, I know how important it is for those decisions to work together. This playbook gives governors and their teams a clear, actionable starting point for using every tool available to them.”

PowerLines is a nonpartisan consumer education nonprofit organization that aims to modernize the utility regulatory system for American energy consumers to lower utility bills and grow the economy.