(The Center Square) – Pennsylvania Senate President Pro Tempore Kim Ward thinks the state is getting the short end of the energy stick because of a “cap” put on a portion of the electricity market, and she assigns some blame to Gov. Josh Shapiro.
PJM Interconnection, the organization that manages the power grid in Pennsylvania, 12 nearby states and the District of Columbia, has received federal approval for a price cap at “capacity auctions” of about $325 per megawatt-day. Capacity auctions are held to secure sufficient power supplies to meet future peak demand, and their results affect only a fraction of a retail customer’s electric bill.
The cap was put in place following a lawsuit filed against PJM by Shapiro. In a new messaging blitz that started Wednesday, Ward said she thinks energy-rich Pennsylvania is getting a raw deal.
Prior to the cap, she said, Pennsylvania capacity prices were less than $300 per megawatt-day, while the price in big swaths of Virginia and Maryland was nearly $450 or more.
Hence, she said, the cap has resulted in Pennsylvania paying more and some states with far fewer energy resources paying a lot less.
“When the governor pushed this cap, he pushed it grid-wide,” Ward said in an interview with The Center Square. “Meaning that you know, it is almost like socialized energy costs. It doesn’t matter what you produce, or how much more you may use a lot of it, you are going to pay the same thing.”
Shapiro is nationally known and is viewed as a potential 2028 Democratic presidential candidate. Ward, of Westmoreland County, is the top Republican in the state Legislature.
A spokeswoman for Shapiro, Rosie Lapowsky, on Wednesday afternoon said a video that was part of Ward’s new messaging contained “false and inaccurate claims” that did not reflect how the PJM system works. The governor, Lapowsky said, took “real, concrete action” on the issue that will result in the average Pennsylvania household saving “over $800 on their energy bills over the next four years.”
Instead of criticizing the governor, Lapowsky said, Ward should “focus on legislation that will help solve these problems.”
The state House is majority Democrats, and the Senate has Republicans majority. Hence, any energy reforms must have bipartisan support.
Lapowsky said Shapiro has put out a comprehensive concept on energy issues but continues to wait “for Republican leadership to put forth any meaningful ideas or legislation.”
The jousting between the two comes just 13 days before the state budget is due, a time when many in the Capitol hope for some semblance of political harmony.
It also comes as artificial intelligence-driven demand for new data centers is leading to communities around the state being overwhelmed by massive and frequently difficult-to-understand proposals for the facilities.
On Wednesday, PJM had no comment on Ward’s presentation.
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, Pennsylvania ranked second in the nation in 2023 in total energy production, with Texas ranking first. Virginia ranked 16th and Maryland ranked 38th. Pennsylvania was far ahead of any other PJM state in terms of energy production.
Other states in the region, Ward said, have favored alternative energy sources at the expense of fossil fuel sources like natural gas and coal.
“So our folks in Pennsylvania, even though we are the largest exporter of this energy, are now paying more, so that Maryland and Virginia can keep following their green energy dreams,” Ward said.
The cap will be in place for a capacity auction to be held next month, as well as one to be held in December. Those auctions are to cover the 2028-29 and 2029-30 years, respectively, and the buyers include electric distribution companies that serve retail customers.
Ward believes other states in the PJM region should pay a “surcharge” for electricity. Another Republican, Sen. Gene Yaw of Lycoming County, has publicly supported the concept.
The all-states-equal price cap, Yaw said, is unfair because it charges every state the same. It would be better, he said, to include a surcharge on areas where shortages have been caused by state policy decisions and rapid growth in electricity demand.
In a May letter to the president and CEO of PJM, Yaw wrote that the current price cap amounts to “socializing the costs of irresponsible policies” across the entire region.
