ANNAPOLIS, Md. — Senators and Delegates grilled utility companies in Annapolis.
Questioning the cause of increased energy bills.
"As you sit here and tell us what's not in your control how sorry you are, your bosses sit on these investor earnings calls and talking about how good these capital expenditures are for your shareholders," said Delegate Lorig Charkoudian a Democrat from Montgomery County.
"Attempting to serve your customers, your constituents with reliable service. We need investors to give us that capital. And we do try to give our investors a detailed projection on what they will receive," said BGE vice president of government and external affairs Charles Washington.
Washington blamed the high energy bills on an abnormally cold winter.
"I think that this is the coldest winter we had since 2014," he said.
BGE is not allowed to profit off the sale of energy.
They do receive profits off projects to upgrade infrastructure and deliver gas or electricity to your home.
Lawmakers question utilities, public service commission on high energy bills
They say it's needed to improve safety and reliability.
"When you get a utility like BGE that is the oldest gas utility in the country, we really have a safety issue with some of that, we call it outmoded but it really is just aging and failing pipe," said Washington.
Republican lawmakers took aim at the Empower Maryland program, something that aims to move people to newer more efficient appliances to cut down on usage and costs.
"Can you tell us what in June is the expected increase in empower and other surcharges," questioned Senator Jason Gallion a Republican from Cecil and Harford Counties.
"Saw in January an increase in $3.34 cents that brought them roughly to $13. By next January they'll be at roughly $25 dollars a month," said Washington who used the average BGE customer and added that BGE supports the Empower program.
The lawmakers also got a chance to question the public service commission.
The group tasked with approving or denying the increases to delivery charges.
Senator Malcolm Augustine took issue with the multi-year rate plan.
It allows BGE and other utilities to map out their spending and rate increases for three years.
Many have blamed it for the increase in delivery costs.
"So my question to you all is why in the world would we have this latest one occur, particularly given this unbelievable increase which basically allows them to write their own check, saying this is how much I'm going to make above and beyond whatever," said Augustine.
"In order to sort of be fair to everybody, including the utility, we're trying to sort of work through this until we make the determination of if this is going to be a permanent part of the process," said Fred Hoover.
While it's unlikely lawmakers will be able to roll back the increases, they could bar the public service commission from approving multi-year plans.
