Utility bills are on the ballot this November, with more than 36 governorships and 9 states holding elections for public utility commissioners, to say nothing of who will control Congress, and the level of scrutiny on the issue of energy affordability is unprecedented in recent years.

According to a briefing from PowerLines, a nonpartisan nonprofit organization that aims to modernize the utility regulatory system and lower utility bills, affordability is on nearly everyone’s mind as voters head to polling places next month.

For American voters, only 1 in 6 believe utilities are prioritizing customer interests over their own, and as far as the government is concerned, only 1 in 4 Americans think their state government is doing enough to protect them from increasing electricity bills.

Charles Hua, PowerLines founder and director, said this could be the first election day where the cost of electricity holds so much sway over voters and their mood.

“Energy has always motivated voters, but it is normally about what you pay at the pump. Electricity is now an issue, and one of the primary sources of frustration for customers,” Hua said, adding that this is no longer a boring, sleepy energy story in the back pages. It’s now on the front page.

“A lot has been made about the role of data centers in determining energy costs, but I would argue that not as much has been made about the role utilities play in determining energy costs,” Hua said. “For the vast majority of utilities in the country, the way they make money is building infrastructure, being reimbursed through the PUC and then profiting off of using it.”

Utilities are requesting more rate increases, which started in the summer of last year, he said. Then utility bills started becoming a new and emerging news phenomenon.

“It rose to the level of a national policy issue for policymakers both nationally and in the states. They are starting to take aggressive measures to either reject rate increases or freeze them. They are using the bully pulpit as well as asking for specific policy changes,” he said.

All elected officials have something to do with electricity prices, that is in comparison with gas prices at the pump, which elected officials do not really have a role to play, he said.

“Prices at the pump have gone up, as have electricity prices. There is just a general feeling of malaise that bills are going up,” he said, adding that one of the big drivers of utility bills going up has been natural gas prices increasing, and this has to do with geopolitical issues such as the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

In a survey PowerLines performed of candidate campaign websites, 81 of 74 gubernatorial candidates mention energy affordability on their campaign websites. Sometimes they also mention data venter (20 mentions), utility transparency (19 mentions) or utility regulators (10 mentions).

“Governors are not the ones who set rates. But they do control state legislative agendas, they set priorities, some can appoint PUC/PSC leadership, and they have the bully pulpit,” he said, adding that many governors are mentioning their PUCs explicitly, including in Massachusetts, Ohio, Texas and Michigan.

PUCs and PSCs broadly determine energy bills, what types of investments utilities make, and determine where projects are located.

“These bodies oversee nearly $200 billion in annual utility spending. They are the Supreme Court of energy policy in the US,” he said. “They are unlike any other body in the authority that they have.”

PUCs have given utilities more of what they have asked for in the past 10 years than they historically have, he said. We are now in a new political moment and this may no longer hold.

Specific policies brought up to help curtail rising electricity bills have included data center moratoriums, rate freezes and requiring data centers to provide their own power, he said.