Community Power Coalition of NH Announces Increase in Portsmouth Community Power Rates, Effective March 3, 2025

PORTSMOUTH – The Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire (CPCNH) has advised its member municipalities, including Portsmouth Community Power, that the electricity supply rates they had announced for the rate period Feb. 1, 2025 through July 31, 2025 will increase on March 3, 2025. The new Granite Basic default rate for residential and small commercial customers will increase from 8.9 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh) to 9.7 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh) and remain in effect through July 31, 2025.

According to CPCNH CEO Brian Callnan who made the announcement, “CPCNH signed a power purchase agreement on January 10, 2025 with a local generator to provide roughly 30 percent of CPCNH’s power needs for the upcoming period at a preferred price. There was a complication on the sellers’ side that proved too difficult to overcome in time for them to honor the delivery of power for CPCNH beginning February 1. CPCNH [moved to purchase] market power on Jan. 28 at a higher price. This has increased our costs for the period resulting in the need for higher rates from March 3 - July 31.”

“The revised rate means that the Granite Basic rate for Portsmouth Community Power customers will be a bit higher than the default Eversource rate for the first time since the launch of the Community Power program in 2023. The difference between Community Power at 9.7 cents and Eversource at 8.929 cents translates to about $5 per month for the average homeowner,” said City Councilor John Tabor, chair of the City’s Energy Advisory Committee which monitors the Portsmouth Community Power program. “The good news is that since launch, Community Power has saved Portsmouth customers more than $2.9 million. We hope that the Coalition will again negotiate rates for the August 2025 through January 2026 rate period that better compete with Eversource.”