Dakota Electric, the state's second-largest retail electric cooperative, won regulatory approval Thursday to raise electric rates by 1.9 percent overall for its 103,000 customers in Dakota County.
Residential customers face a 2.5 percent increase and small businesses a 3.5 percent increase under a rate formula that differs among types of customers based on the cost of serving them. That effect on bills will be less than that because customers have been paying a 1.5 percent interim increase since last year.
The increase approved by the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission raises the monthly basic rate, paid regardless of how much electricity is consumed, from $8 to $9 for residential customers and from $10 to $14 for small businesses. The basic rate for industrial and some other customer classes also went up.
Doug Larson, Dakota Electric's vice president of regulatory services, said the PUC approved about 96 percent of the cooperative's $4.1 million requested increase. The request, to cover inflation and ongoing maintenance, was first in five years.
Of Minnesota's 44 electric distribution cooperatives, only Dakota Electric has rates set by the PUC. State law allows co-ops' elected boards to set electric rates unless members vote to be state-regulated, as Dakota Electric's did in 1981.
David Shaffer • 612-673-7090
