Powerless in the Pandemic: After Bailouts, Electric Utilities Chose Profits Over People

Electric Utilities Took $1.25 Billion in Pandemic Bailouts While Shutting Off Power to Households Nearly 1 Million Times, according to new research from BailoutWatch and the Center for Biological Diversity. The Center for Biological Diversity and BailoutWatch today released Powerless in the Pandemic, a report showing some of the nation’s top electric utilities received a collective $1.25 billion from last year’s government bailouts while shutting off families’ electric service nearly 1 million times. Utilities wielded political power to secure beneficial tax-code changes in the CARES Act, but defied calls to grant their own customers temporary relief. Instead, 16 utilities suspended or canceled electric service to nearly 1 million households between February 2020 and June 2021, leaving people without hot water, refrigeration, air conditioning and medical devices, while the pandemic raged. This pushed people to become transient or unsheltered, making it impossible to maintain social distancing practices. With the money utilities spent on executive pay and dividends, the report finds, many could have bailed out their customers more than 500 times. Other key findings: Nine companies received tax bailouts totaling $1.12 billion. It would have cost just 9.4% of that bailout total to prevent every shutoff reported. For what taxpayers spent bailing them out, 16 companies (all but NextEra) could have forgiven all unpaid accounts — hundreds of times over in some cases. A six-member Hall of Shame — NextEra Energy (parent of Florida Power & Light and others), Duke Energy, Southern Company, Dominion Energy, Exelon, and DTE Energy — perpetrated 94% of all shutoffs documented. NextEra alone accounted for nearly half. Duke Energy and DTE Energy together received $845 million, more than 75% of the tax bailout money the report identified in the utilities sector. They cut off customers’ power more than 203,000 times. Their tax bailouts provided enough unexpected revenue to forgive the underlying unpaid bills more than 150 times.