Electricity bills for Washington County's data centers will climb nearly 30% starting July 8, while PGE's residential customers, including households across Bethany, Cedar Mill and Oak Hills, will see a modest rate cut.

The Oregon Public Utility Commission voted unanimously on July 7 to approve Portland General Electric's 29.7% rate increase for large energy users, primarily the data centers clustered in nearby Hillsboro. Residential PGE customers will get a 1.3% decrease under the same order.

The decision implements Oregon's POWER Act, a landmark law passed in 2025 that requires energy-hungry industrial users to cover more of the grid costs their growth creates rather than shifting those expenses to households and small businesses.

Nearly all of PGE's data center customers operate in Washington County. The new rate class covers five companies across 16 sites, according to commission filings.

The affected operators include Flexential, Stack Infrastructure, QTS, NTT and Digital Realty Trust. QTS leases space to Meta, and other Hillsboro data center clients include TikTok, LinkedIn and X.

Those facilities have grown fast. PGE reported that its data center electricity load jumped from 50 average megawatts in spring 2020 to more than 300 average megawatts by mid-2025, equivalent to powering about 240,000 homes.

The industry occupies 436 acres in Hillsboro, with 50 more acres of new construction planned or underway.

For PGE's roughly 963,000 customers statewide, the restructuring is meant to reverse years of cost-shifting. The Oregon Citizens' Utility Board said residential customers had been paying more than twice as much per kilowatt-hour as data centers before this change. Between 2019 and 2025, PGE residential rates rose a cumulative 61%.

The 1.3% residential decrease won't erase those increases, but it marks the first time in years that household bills have moved in the right direction. Small businesses will also see slightly lower rates.

"I'm sure the data centers won't be happy with this rate hike. But it is what is right for Oregonians," Bob Jenks, executive director of the Citizens Utility Board, said at a July 3, press conference in Salem.

PGE filed its proposed rates in early June after the commission approved the POWER Act framework on Thursday, May 7. Regulators initially paused the filing to review technical problems, then allowed PGE to submit corrections.

The final 29.7% figure is slightly higher than PGE's original 29% proposal due to those adjustments.

The Alliance of Western Energy Consumers asked the commission to suspend implementation and hold a formal hearing, arguing the revisions were extensive enough to qualify as a general rate case. The commission declined.

Commission chair Letha Tawney said she was "comfortable with the amount of review" already completed and did not believe "customers are served by further delay on this decision."

Jenks said he expects data centers to appeal the ruling.

Gov. Tina Kotek has recommended pausing new data center projects until her Data Center Advisory Committee proposes reforms later in 2026.

PGE will reassess data centers' cost impact in its next general rate case, which could trigger further rate changes.

PacifiCorp, Oregon's other major investor-owned utility, must develop its own data center rate design under the POWER Act. Full implementation is required by 2028.