Some South Dakotans Will Be Paying a Lot More for Electricity

Nearly 65,000 households across South Dakota are seeing their electric bills go up this month.

This week (January 9), the South Dakota Public Utilities Commission (PUC) approved a rate increase for NorthWestern Energy’s electric customers in the state.

It's the first rate increase for the Sioux Falls-based company since 2015.

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When NorthWestern first submitted plans for the price hike in the summer of 2023, the company was seeking to generate $30.9 million in additional annual revenue, which translated into a more than 25 percent increase in base electric rates, which would increase the average consumers monthly bill be more than 16 percent..

After months of negotiating with the PUC, those numbers were lowered to a base increase of a little less than 18 percent and an increase of slightly more than 11 percent for the average customer's bill.

That means the typical residential customer using an average of 750 kWh per month will see an increase of $13.67 on the monthly bill. That's an additional $164.04 per year.

The new rates went into effect January 10 for 64,680 electric customers in South Dakota.