SDG&E bills will be a bit higher this year

San Diego Gas & Electric’s energy delivery prices in 2026 will be slightly higher than the utility predicted one month ago.

In December, SDG&E officials gave a presentation to the San Diego City Council and estimated that typical residential customers would pay $3 more on the delivery portion of their electricity bills in the new year and $1 more if their homes have natural gas hookups.

But in emails sent this week to ratepayers, SDG&E says typical residential customers will actually pay about an additional dollar in each case — $4 more on their electricity bills in 2026 and almost $2 more on their natural gas bills.

SDG&E representatives on Friday told the Union-Tribune the estimates given to the council were based on figures compiled as of October. Since then, additional data through the end of 2025 came in, more precise calculations were made and the revisions resulted in an uptick in the numbers.

Overall electricity delivery costs increased due to a combination of factors that included improvements to the grid, such as building new substations and upgrading and adding circuits.

The revision in gas bills was largely the result of higher commodity prices for natural gas compared to one year ago, on top of pipeline safety upgrades and program costs mandated by the state.

When all is said and done, the 2026 systemwide average for the electricity delivery rate in SDG&E’s service territory is now expected to increase from 21 cents per kilowatt-hour to 22.5 cents for residential customers who are not on bill-assistance programs.

For typical customers who use 400 kilowatt-hours in a given month, that would translate to the average delivery charge rising from $133 per month to $137.

For typical customers using natural gas, the 2026 bill for customers using 33 therms in winter should see their average gas bill rise from about $90 per month to $92. A therm refers to one unit of natural gas.

The updated numbers come as complaints about high utility bills — in the San Diego area and across California — intensify.

A 2023 blog post by the Haas Energy Institute at UC Berkeley reported SDG&E had the highest electricity rate in California.

“At SDG&E, we work every day to manage our costs and develop programs and tools that help make energy more affordable and accessible,” SDG&E spokesperson Anthony Wagner said. “We know that any change in energy costs makes a difference to our customers, and we work to keep bills as low as possible while continuing to deliver the safe, reliable energy that families and businesses across Southern California depend upon every day.”

During the public comment period at the Dec. 15 City Council meeting, about 25 San Diego residents expressed their frustrations.

“I currently live with my parents,” a young man living in District 4 said, “and I can count on one hand how many times my parents have turned on the thermostat to use the AC (air conditioning) and heating because they don’t want to pay more on their electric bills.”

The 2026 increases also affect customers enrolled in the two community choice energy aggregation, or CCA, programs in the region — San Diego Community Power and the Clean Energy Alliance.

As per state rules, CCAs purchase electricity generation for customers in their respective municipalities. But legacy utilities such as SDG&E are still responsible for the costs associated with transmitting, distributing and delivering power across the region.

Customers can expect to see a couple of more adjustments to their SDG&E bills this year.

As soon as Thursday, the California Public Utilities Commission is scheduled to vote on a proposed decision related to the costs of reducing the risk of wildfires in SDG&E’s service territory from 2019 through 2022.

If approved by a majority of the five voting members of the commission, the average residential bill for SDG&E customers not enrolled in the California Alternate Rates for Energy (CARE) program will increase by $5 per month.

But on the positive side for customers, a reduction of about $3 per month is anticipated later this year, in the aftermath of a separate decision issued by the utilities commission, also known as the CPUC.

It’s a bit complicated, but the CPUC approved SDG&E’s general rate case in late 2024.

Essentially a budget outline, a general rate case estimates what the commission thinks it will cost to maintain and upgrade the power system for each investor-owned utility in California over a four-year period.

On a 4-0 vote in December 2024, the CPUC approved a rate increase of 2.6% for electricity and 1.8% for natural gas for 2024 through 2027.

But the commission did not approve the decision until 2024 was almost over. As a result, the rate increases had to be amortized into customer bills for 18 months starting in 2025 to make up for what was not collected.

That 18-month period of higher amortized costs will end by the middle of 2026, which means a reduction in average residential SDG&E bills of about $3 per month starting around August.