Eversource projects that its next electric distribution rate application will total more than $3 billion in potential ratepayer costs following years of delays and new infrastructure mandates, according to a March 2025 letter sent by Eversource Vice President for Distribution Rates and Regulatory Requirements Douglas P. Horton to Senate President Pro-Tem Martin Looney, D-New Haven.

Horton sent the letter following Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA) Commissioner David Arconti’s testimony before the Legislative and Executive Nominations Committee in March of last year. While most of the attention on those proceedings was on former PURA Chairman Marissa Gillett – who resigned shortly thereafter – Looney’s questions to Arconti about why there has not been a distribution rate case for Connecticut Light & Power since 2018, sparked the Eversource executive to reach out.

In the letter, Horton lays out various accrued and future costs that have built up since 2018 through delays in settling five years of storm cost recovery or mandated advanced metering infrastructure that has yet to be implemented due to “obstacles” placed by PURA, and warns that the next rate case will result in a “substantial rate increase.” 

“Eversource is aware that PURA has socialized the proposition that the interests of electric customers will be furthered as soon as PURA can ‘get under the hood’ and use its ‘tools’ in a CL&P rate application to change distribution rates and impose a performance-based ratemaking (‘PBR’) framework,” Horton wrote in the letter. “However, this is a false premise. There is no relief for customers that is coming from an electric distribution rate case given the magnitude of the cost issues PURA has piled up for that case.”

“In fact, PURA directives for CL&P’s future rate case contemplates a $3 billion rate proceeding, including an estimated base revenue deficiency in the range of $400 million or more, deferred storm costs of at least $1.2 billion, and a five-year reliability and resiliency plan on the order of $400 million and consideration of costs for advanced metering infrastructure totaling $1.2 billion,” Horton continued. “All of these cost items are stacked up for resolution in that case, which is not in the interests of customers.”

Eversource is currently claiming in docket filings that the storm recovery costs have grown to $1.5 billion, with $7 million accruing in interest each month, so the $3 billion contemplated in Horton’s letter has already increased substantially. However, there is debate between Eversource and Consumer Counsel over how and when interest can be collected that will have to be adjudicated by PURA.

The lengthy letter also addresses the claim that it is only during a rate proceeding that PURA can “get under the hood” of CL&P’s operations, noting that PURA embarked on a two-year audit of Eversource’s management and operations between 2022 and 2024. The audit, at that time, had yet to be published, even though the audit company had submitted the final report two weeks prior. PURA published the massive public version of the Eversource audit, which included all its energy companies, a year later in February of 2026. 

While Connecticut’s regulated energy companies have annual hearings to adjust rates related to transmission and public benefits costs, general distribution rate cases, which essentially set how much revenue and return on equity Eversource or Avangrid can make, typically occur every four to six years.

Eversource’s last rate case was eight years ago, and although the company’s rate application sought $336 million over three years, PURA reduced that amount by $182 million. Eversource’s 2018 application included $700 million in investments, according to a release by the Office of Consumer Counsel, who noted that “some level of rate increase was warranted under applicable law.”

Although the contentious relationship between the utility companies and PURA appears to have subsided with the departure of Gillett and the addition of new commissioners, there has yet to be a review of the growing storm costs, and there is no agreed upon mechanism for Eversource to recover costs associated with replacing its existing meters with smart meters. – the cost of which has increased from $600 million in 2021 to $1.2 billion, according to the letter.

Eversource has claimed that decisions issued by PURA in the past denying cost recoveries have resulted in credit downgrades to the company and increased the costs of borrowing to invest in upgrading the state’s electric infrastructure. Despite the protracted battles in court between the utility companies and PURA, ratepayers’ electricity costs have continued to increase and have become a political talking point in the upcoming 2026 elections. 

Connecticut ratepayers currently cover roughly $1 billion per year in public benefits charges tied to government programs and energy procurement mandates, and have some of the highest electricity costs in the nation.

“Unless PURA is planning on abandoning all applicable law, CL&P’s rate application will cause a substantial rate increase for customers,” Horton wrote. “In the context of a debilitating outcome from PURA, credit-rating downgrades will occur (again) and performance-based ratemaking will not be implemented as judicial appeals will proceed from there. This should not be an outcome that anyone is seeking.” 

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