12/17/2025
Conclusion
Electricity affordability is a function of state-level policy choices. States that have embraced aggressive renewable mandates, 100% “carbon-free” targets, premature coal and nuclear retirements, rooftop-solar cost shifting, and restrictions on natural gas infrastructure routinely deliver the nation’s highest electricity prices. California and New York, the poster children for this approach, now charge their residents and businesses significantly more than the national average, with price increases that have consistently outpaced the rest of the country.
In contrast, states that have prioritized dispatchable, affordable generation consistently deliver the lowest electricity prices. Florida keeps rates below the national average despite near-universal air-conditioning demand and frequent hurricanes. Louisiana enjoys the third-lowest rates in the nation while utilizing its abundant natural gas resources. Both states have done so under sustained Republican governance that has largely rejected the renewablemandate model.
Americans pay dramatically different electric bills depending on which party controls their state capitol. High electricity prices are not an inevitability; they are a choice. And in state after state, they are a choice made by left-wing policymakers who have prioritized climate symbolism over working families’ budgets.
When even deep-blue New York is forced to delay its own cap-and-tax scheme because it would impose “extraordinary and damaging costs” on residents, and when California ratepayers are paying double the national average to subsidize an electricity system that still imports power from neighboring states, the verdict is in. Americans struggling with utility bills need the same thing Florida and Louisiana residents already have: state leaders willing to put affordability and reliability ahead of ideological mandates. Until more states follow the red-state model, millions of households and businesses will continue to pay the price for expensive electricity as a deliberate political choice.
Additional Resources
Mitch Rolling and Isaac Orr, “States with Clean Energy Mandates Have Higher Rate Increases,” Energy Bad Boys, November 29, 2025
Mitch Rolling and Isaac Orr, “The Rhyme and Reason Behind Rising Electricity Prices,” Energy Bad Boys, November 22, 2025
“New York Is Missing Its Climate Mandates Despite Paying High Electricity Prices to Meet Them,” Institute for Energy Research, December 5, 2025
Caleb Jasso, “California, the Energy Island,” Institute for Energy Research, July 29, 2025
“The Challenges and Costs of Net-Zero and the Future of Energy,” Institute for Energy Research, August 9, 2023
Isaac Orr and Mitch Rolling, “Eight Slides on the Future of Electricity Prices,” Energy Bad Boys, November 15, 2025
Caleb Jasso, “California’s Green Gambit: A Timeline,” Institute for Energy Research, November 19, 2025
Isaac Orr and Mitch Rolling, “The Top Eight Takeaways for the Lawrence Berkeley/Brattle Factors Influencing Electricity Prices Study,” Energy Bad Boys, October 25, 2025
“Florida Has Low Prices, No Green Policies,” Institute for Energy Research, October 22, 2024
Read more by clicking article below:
Electricity Prices: Elections Have Consequences
