La Mesa SDG&E Customers To Get Relief On February, March Bills

LA MESA, CA — If your last gas and electric bill made you cringe, there is relief on the way for La Mesa, Mt. Helix and San Diego County residents and customers of San Diego Gas & Electric, the utility announced Thursday. Residential utility ratepayers will receive around $104 in bill credit on their February and March San Diego Gas & Electric statements, a spokesperson said.

Thursday, a decision was made by the California Public Utilities Commission to advance the timing of two of three scheduled installments of California Climate Credit to provide winter bill relief to residents statewide.

January saw record-high natural gas prices, and SDG&E leaders said they hope this might provide relief.

"Over the past few weeks, SDG&E and CPUC staff met several times to explore the feasibility of moving up the climate credit to provide our customers with bill relief," said SDG&E Vice President of Customer Services Dana Golan. "In anticipation of today's vote, our billing group has been working hard to put procedures into place to accelerate the climate credit as quickly as possible."

SDG&E's residential gas customers will see a $43.40 credit on their February bill. Electric customers will see a $60.70 credit on their March bill and the same amount on a bill in the second half of the year. Customers will see the climate credit reflected on their next bill.

This year's climate credit totals up to $164.80. In the past three years, SDG&E disbursed the climate credit in three installments with the gas credit appearing in the April billing cycle, and the electric credit appearing in the August and September billing cycles.

The California Climate Credit is a state program that requires power plants, natural gas providers and other large industries that emit greenhouse gases to buy carbon pollution permits. The credit on customers' bills "represents their share of the payments from the state's program and provides customers with an increased opportunity to invest in energy-saving products," according to an SDG&E statement.

There is no action required to receive the credit. All gas and electricity customers, including community choice aggregation customers, will automatically receive the credit in their upcoming billing cycles.

City News Service, Patch Editor Ashley Ludwig contributed to this report.