Missouri's second-largest electricity provider is looking to increase household energy bills by approximately $17 a month, citing investments in power generation, improvements to the electrical grid and rising operating costs. Evergy Missouri West announced on Tuesday that it had filed a request with the Missouri Public Service Commission (MPSC) to review its electricity rates. The proposal would increase bills by $17.25 a month, or $207 annually, for a typical residential customer consuming 1,005 kilowatt-hours of electricity.
The rate is yet to be approved, meaning there are no immediate changes to bills for its customers. Evergy was formed through the 2018 merger of Great Plains Energy and Westar Energy and operates two regulated utilities in Missouri: Evergy Missouri Metro, which primarily serves the Kansas City area, and Evergy Missouri West, which serves communities in western Missouri outside the Metro service territory. The proposed rate increase applies only to Evergy Missouri West, which serves more than 340,000 customers.
The company explained that the request is linked to significant expansions of company-owned energy generating infrastructure. This includes the Foxtrot Energy Center and Sunflower Sky Energy Center. These are expected online in spring 2027, providing a combined 172 MW of solar power, according to Evergy; this is enough to power around 34,000 homes.
It is also seeking to recover costs relating to new natural-gas generation plants that are due to enter service in 2029, 2030 and 2032, providing 1,065 MW of power. "Evergy Missouri West customers have the lowest rates of all our customers and some of the lowest in the Midwest and the nation," said David Campbell, Evergy chairman and chief executive officer, in a statement. "The investments included in this request will add new power plants and strengthen the system serving our Missouri West customers.
At the same time, revenue from new data centers is helping reduce the amount we are requesting." Newsweek reached out to Evergy and the Missouri Public Service Commission via email for comment and is awaiting responses. In the announcement, Evergy said that it anticipates two large data centers will reduce the rate request by $61 million annually. This is because large data center customers will pay a premium compared to other large energy users.
Evergy said this will protect communities from taking on the costs of more energy use in the area by data centers. "Our large customer rate structure allows the revenue from data centers to put downward pressure on rates for all other customers, while providing important protections against shifting the costs of serving those data centers to our existing customers," Campbell said. There is also an unusual profit-sharing proposal put forward by the company.
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