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PUC Issues Order on Utility’s Default Service Solicitations
On July 29, 2026 the New Hampshire PUC issued a supplemental order of notice regarding Liberty utilities default service solicitations.
“By this Supplemental Order of Notice, as indicated by the Commission in Order No. 28,231 (June 18, 2026), issued in this instant docket regarding Liberty Utilities (Granite State Electric) Corp. d/b/a Liberty (Liberty, or the Company) default energy service (Default Service) rates for effect on August 1, 2026, the Commission opens a further phase of Liberty’s Default Service proceeding to examine questions related to Liberty’s Default Service proxy-price development methodology and Default Service reconciliations, as delineated below. The Commission hereby schedules a hearing for November 17, 2026 at 10:00 a.m. regarding these matters.”
New rates became effective August 1, 2026.
Among other things, the New Hampshire PUC opened a further phase of the proceeding to consider:
(1) “whether the proxy-price development methodology for the ISO-New England market-based procurement components for Liberty’s Default Service rates should be adjusted from the current approved methodology to incorporate a market-futures based pricing element, or lowest-accepted RFP bid pricing approach, or some combination thereof, going forward”;
(2) “whether the Default Service reconciliation cycle for Liberty should be shortened” from annual to semiannual;
(3) “the provenance and accuracy of the current Liberty Default Service reconciliation balances, and whether these balances should be adjusted due to accounting errors or other sources of misallocation”; and
(4) “discussion of the best means of working out these reconciliation balances in the Company’s rates.”
Also on July 29, 2026 the New Hampshire DOE filed an objection to CPCNH’s motion for partial rehearing.
The New Hampshire DOE argued that “CPCNH is incorrectly seeking rehearing,” given that it: (1) “directly contradicts the relief it sought in its Expedited Joint Motion to Resolve Rehearing,” which requested NHPUC defer adjudication; and (2) “did not seek rehearing of the Commission’s June 8, 2026, Procedural Order… which deferred adjudication of the proxy-price methodology and default-service reconciliation schedules.”
As noted above, Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire (CPCNH) on July 20, 2026 filed a motion for partial rehearing of the 6/18/26 order, clarified by its 7/2/26 procedural order, or supplemental order of notice on 7/20/26. CPCNH: (1) requested reconsideration on the basis that “the Order is unlawful or unreasonable because it approves default service rates that recover only a small portion of Liberty’s accumulated under-collection while expressly deferring adjudication of the proxy price methodology, reconciliation timing and frequency, and other issues essential to determining whether the resulting rates are just and reasonable” ; and (2) requested that, in the alternative NHPUC “issue a Supplemental Order of Notice by July 31, 2026 which directs the parties to establish a procedural schedule inclusive of the following issues”: (i) “proxy-pricing design and use”; (ii) “reconciliation balances, frequency, and timing”; (iii) spot-market exposure; (iv) reporting transparency; (v) “load settlement accuracy and related loss factor assumptions”; (vi) “measures to improve competitive neutrality”; (vii) “deviations between rates and actual costs”; (viii) “accuracy of price signals”; and (ix) “consistency with the policy objectives of state statutes.”
On July 23, 2026 Liberty filed its wholesale market price comparison table.
