PA's Energy Advantage Should Lower Bills, Not Get Trapped by Poor Decisions

Energy affordability is top of mind across America, but in Northeast Pennsylvania it is especially personal. After living in the region for close to 20 years, I know that when energy costs rise, families feel it in heating bills, electric bills, groceries, travel, and nearly everything else.

In a recent letter to the Pennsylvania Senate Consumer Protection and Professional Licensure Committee, the Marcellus Shale Coalition cited Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission data showing that purchased gas costs for major Pennsylvania natural gas utilities have fallen sharply since large-scale Marcellus production began, with several seeing supply-cost declines of 50 percent or more.

An abundance of natural gas in the region has helped shield Pennsylvania from the high costs faced in places like Europe or, closer to home, New York and New England. Policy resistance and infrastructure constraints have often made it harder for that energy to reach consumers in nearby states, despite their proximity to Marcellus Shale resources. The lesson is clear: having energy nearby is not enough. If policy prevents resources from being developed, moved, or used, families and employers pay the price.

Energy choice and affordability are even more important as demand grows, but reliability has to be part of the equation too. That was especially clear during the July Fourth heat wave. My family and I live in Houston, where July heat is expected. But as we prepared to enjoy Philadelphia’s celebrations for America’s 250th birthday, it felt like the weather map had flipped.

Across PJM, the grid felt that pressure too. Reuters reported that demand reached roughly 162,700 megawatts, close to its record.

PJM generation data tells the same story. During the highest-demand window, July 1 and 2, natural gas was the largest source of electricity in the mix. It averaged about 63,700 megawatts, up roughly 7,800 megawatts from before the heat wave, and supplied about 44.5 percent of PJM generation. At the peak hour on July 1, natural gas provided nearly 74,600 megawatts of power.

That mattered for reliability and affordability. Natural gas did not just backstop the grid. It anchored the supply stack with dispatchable power when demand was highest. Without that supply, PJM would have had to lean harder on more expensive resources, emergency actions, imports, or scarcity pricing, and that assumes enough alternative supply was even available. That is the uncomfortable reality behind today’s energy debate: affordability depends not only on what energy costs, but on whether enough dependable power exists when demand surges.

The goal should not be energy policy that sounds good in a press release. The goal should be energy policy that works.

A practical standard should judge every proposal: Will it help keep energy affordable, reliable, and increasingly cleaner, or add costs without delivering enough dependable power?

Pennsylvania has experience with policies that add costs to electric bills. State energy mandates and compliance programs may be well intended, but they are not free. Their costs eventually flow to ratepayers. Even when the added cost on each bill appears modest, the statewide burden can be significant. For families already dealing with higher grocery prices, housing costs, insurance premiums, and inflation, there is no painless increase.

This does not mean Pennsylvania should reject innovation or ignore environmental progress. It means policymakers should be honest about what progress requires. Cleaner energy, reliable power, and affordable bills are not competing goals. They depend on the ability to produce energy and move it where it is needed. Pipelines, power plants, transmission lines, storage, and related infrastructure are not obstacles to affordability or environmental progress. Done responsibly, they are essential to both.

For Northeast Pennsylvania, the path forward should be practical: support responsible natural gas production, build needed infrastructure, encourage new generation, protect reliability, and make affordability a central test of every energy decision. Pennsylvania’s energy advantage is real, and policymakers should ensure it benefits families, workers, businesses, and communities.

William desRosiers is a Texas-based energy and government affairs professional who built his career in Pennsylvania and has long supported education, workforce, historic preservation, and community initiatives across the Commonwealth. The views expressed are his own.