Rate increase got you stumped? Click line-by-line through your power bill

By David McGrath Schwartz

Friday, July 8, 2011 | 2:05 a.m.

Click on each line of the bill below for an explanation of the term and the charge. Current rates can be compared to the rate changes being requested by NV energy by using the two bars at the bottom. Each color corresponds to a line on the bill.

Last month, NV Energy requested that state regulators approve a general rate increase of 24 percent.

No need to worry, the company said, customers won’t feel a thing — at least immediately. Single-family residential bills will be no higher on Jan. 1, when the new rate takes effect, than they were on July 1, the company said.

But how can the general rate rise but bills stay the same?

The answer lies in the fact that your power bill is composed of seven — soon to be eight — separate charges. And NV Energy is using required decreases in other rates — primarily customers’ overpayments for fuel to fire power plants — to offset the increases to rates.

It can be confusing. But to make it less so, the Sun has detailed what all of those numbers and odd-sounding charges on your NV Energy bill mean, and how they will change over the next six months.