The state Public Utility Commission cut a requested water rate hike by Pennsylvania American Water by more than half on Thursday.<\/p>\n
An approximately $74.9 million annual revenue increase authorized Thursday by the PUC will allow the water company to support critical improvements, including replacing aging infrastructure, expanding PFAS treatment and continuing lead service line replacement efforts, PAW officials said.<\/p>\n
In Scranton and throughout Northeast Pennsylvania, the work includes 41 completed wastewater improvement projects since the acquisition of the Scranton Sewer Authority, prevention of approximately 118 million gallons of overflow annually from entering the Lackawanna River, ongoing dam safety and resiliency improvements at Maple Lake, Marshwood Reservoir and Dunmore Dam No. 7, and investments that strengthen long-term water supply reliability and public safety, water company officials added.<\/p>\n
Commission members voted 4-1 to approve a motion modifying the company\u2019s proposed rates for water and wastewater services.<\/p>\n
Under Pennsylvania American Water\u2019s proposal, water rates would have increased by more than $143.4 million and wastewater rates would have increased by more than $16.1 million, PUC officials said.<\/p>\n
Pennsylvania American Water filed a request with the PUC Nov. 14 to adjust its water and wastewater rates reflecting $1.2 billion in water and wastewater system investments the utility will be making through mid-2027 to modernize and strengthen its water and wastewater systems in communities across Pennsylvania, PAW officials said.<\/p>\n
The PUC maintains the authority to grant all, some, or none of utility companies\u2019 rate adjustment requests. The new rates will take effect Aug. 13, PUC officials said.<\/p>\n
Pennsylvania American Water, which provides water and wastewater services to approximately 810,000 customers in portions of 38 counties across the state, last filed for an increase in water distribution and wastewater base rates in 2023, according to the PUC.<\/p>\n
The rate hikes come on the heels of a proposed merger of American Water Works, which is the parent firm of Pennsylvania American Water, and Essential Utilities, the parent company of Aqua Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n
The two parent companies announced in October the proposed merger to become \u201ca leading regulated U.S. water and wastewater public utility\u201d with a combined value of $63 billion. The agreement calls for American Water shareholders to own 69% of the combined company and Essential shareholders to own 31%.<\/p>\n
The merger application remains pending with the PUC.<\/p>\n
A water company rate hike request in November 2023 generated opposition from area legislators, residents and the municipalities of Scranton and Dunmore, as well as complaints about water quality and service.\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
In July 2024, the PUC slashed the rate increase sought by PAW by over $100 million, or more than 50%, and launched an investigation into the company\u2019s water quality and service in its Northeast Pennsylvania territory.<\/p>\n
The area includes the counties of Carbon, Lackawanna, Lehigh, Luzerne, Monroe, Northampton, Pike, Schuylkill, Susquehanna, Wayne and Wyoming. In these counties, PAW has 36 water systems, each with their own operating characteristics and raw water quality, and the largest of which is Scranton\u2019s water system.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The state Public Utility Commission cut a requested water rate hike by Pennsylvania American Water by more than…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34397,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[60,201,182,803,28,30,29,181],"class_list":["post-246172","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-business","tag-lackawanna-county","tag-local-news","tag-luzerne-county","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news","tag-top-stories-stt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246172","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=246172"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246172\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34397"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=246172"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=246172"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=246172"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}