
It has been four years since electric utilities in Ohio have been allowed to run portfolios of energy efficiency programs for their customers. Since the state’s mandated energy efficiency resource standard (EERS) portfolios were wrapped up in 2020, utilities and advocates have supported bringing back EE through proposed voluntary portfolios in docketed proceedings with the Public Utility Commission of Ohio (PUCO). None of the attempts have been approved as proposed, and a few limited programs that have been negotiated through settlement agreements are a tiny drop in an empty bucket.
How did we get here?
Ohio’s EERS was created by the signing of 127th General Assembly Senate Bill 221 in 2008. That bill created a standard that required the state’s Electric Distribution Utilities (EDUs; the investor-owned electric utilities) to implement energy efficiency portfolios, which would ramp up to 2.0% of utility sales required to be met through EE by 2019. (Spoiler: This was not achieved.) Despite bipartisan support for the EERS, it was pretty much downhill from there.
An attempt in the 128th General Assembly to create a statewide EE stakeholder advisory group, a la Illinois, died in committee without a hearing. The transparency and collaboration that could have occurred if this had passed might have gone a long way toward preventing the eventual demise of the EERS, but we never got the chance to find out.
After that failed attempt to strengthen EE in Ohio, all that was left was a series of attacks. In the 130th General Assembly, Substitute SB 310 froze the EERS ramp-up at 2014 levels of 1.0% for two years, added an opt-out for mercantile and industrial customers and allowed utilities unlimited “banking” of all savings achieved above the EERS requirement to be used to meet later years’ requirements. Then, once that freeze was ready to thaw, the 131st General Assembly passed HB 554, which would have made the freeze permanent. Governor Kasich vetoed that bill, however, and EE continued for a few more years.
Then came the 133rd General Assembly and the notorious HB 6, wherein the Speaker of the House and the Chair of the Public Utility Commission of Ohio were bribed by utility executives to bail out nuclear and coal plants and overturn the EERS. Testimony assured committee members that utilities would be able to propose voluntary EE portfolios for PUCO approval going forward. As a result of the signature by Gov. DeWine in 2019, all electric EE portfolios approved under the SB 221 EERS were terminated in 2020, mostly using the “banked” savings from previous years to show that the cumulative goal set forth in HB 6 had been met.
Over the next two years, several of Ohio’s EDUs filed multiple proposals as standalone cases and as part of rate cases to get authorization for voluntary efficiency portfolios. Broadly, PUCO felt that it could not approve voluntary portfolios without new legislation authorizing them to do so. That is despite the testimony on HB 6 to the contrary or the presentations by multiple stakeholders (including MEEA) in energy efficiency workshops held in 2022 expressing their desire for voluntary programs and their opinion that PUCO retains the same authority it had to approve voluntary programs now that it had prior to SB 221.
Concurrent with PUCO’s workshops and the filing of voluntary portfolio proposals, the legislature attempted to get new authorization for voluntary programs, via 134th General Assembly HB 389. Substitute HB 389 was reported out by the House Public Utilities Committee in November of 2021. It never got a floor vote and died when the session adjourned at the end of 2022.
Where are we now?
Without mandatory portfolios from SB 221, and without voluntary portfolios approved, there is essentially no electric energy efficiency happening in Ohio. From 2020 to 2021, there was a 99.6% reduction in the amount of energy efficiency savings reported by EDUs in Ohio to the federal Energy Information Administration (EIA). There is currently a small amount of EDU electric energy efficiency coming from low-income weatherization and smart thermostat programs negotiated under settlement agreements in a few rate cases and/or energy security plan cases, and an even smaller amount coming from the unregulated publicly owned utilities (POUs; i.e., municipal & co-operative utilities). Though they are not regulated by the PUCO for energy efficiency, POU EE savings have dropped off concurrent with the drop in EDU savings, but that also could be more because of the pandemic and subsequent lack of momentum than from anti-EE sentiment.
As the graphs below show, in 2023, Ohio’s EDUs collectively reported 35,930 MWh of electricity savings, while the POUs reported 6,959 MWh saved.

Source: US Energy Information Administration, Form EIA-861
The Latest Bill to Fail – House Bill 79
The latest attempt to bring legislative reauthorization for electric energy efficiency in Ohio came in the form of the 135th General Assembly HB 79. Like its predecessor HB 389, it would have allowed the EDUs to voluntarily propose EE portfolios. Like HB 389, it was reported out of committee in the House in the first half of the biennial session, in June of 2023. Like HB 389, it then sat without getting a reading on the House floor. Despite assurances from sponsors and lobbyists, it never made it onto the agenda. That finally changed a year later when the bill unexpectedly was passed by the House in June 2024. Whereupon it languished again until November, when it finally got sponsor testimony in the Senate Energy and Public Utilities Committee. Its fourth reading was scheduled for the last legislative day of the session, December 18, 2024, but at the last minute the committee meeting was cancelled and that was the end for HB 79.
HB 79 was an imperfect energy efficiency bill. It had provisions that would greatly limit the potential energy savings that could be achieved, such as:
- Mercantile/industrial customer full exemption with opt-in.
- Residential & commercial opt-out, with requirements to inform customers multiple times that they could do so, and which would be permanent until the customer opts back in.
- Overly complicated cost cap.
- Customer bill impact caps that would limit funds available for program implementation
- Voluntary plan filing but a requirement that filed plans hit a specific EE target rather than allowing utilities to propose what their potential studies show to be cost-effective.
- Disallows stacking or braiding with federal rebates or incentives.
Despite the flaws, HB 79 also had some strong provisions that would have been beneficial for developing robust portfolios and increasing compliance and transparency:
- Utility cost test for cost-effectiveness, with allowance for “any other quantifiable utility system benefits” not directly specified in the bill. (This is in line with the principles of the National Standard Practice Manual.)
- Provides for the standard components of the utility business model for energy efficiency by allowing cost recovery, lost revenue adjustment and performance incentives.
- No need to calculate net-to-gross – only gross savings reporting required, which would lessen evaluation costs and regulatory burden.
- Requirement for annual reporting on a specified date.
If it had passed, the bill would have allowed electric EE to return to Ohio, even if it was below the potential that could be saved. It would have given the PUCO clear direction to approve filings and let efficiency move forward. Overall, HB 79 would have provided enough framework and incentive for utilities to have EE portfolios and provide EE to at least some of their customers again.
Where do we go from here?
As we go into the 136th General Assembly, it’s uncertain whether energy efficiency will be on the table again. News indicates that Senate President Matt Huffman is working on a “comprehensive plan for more energy creation” and that HB 79 and a brownfield distributed generation bill were killed to protect the chances of a rumored energy omnibus bill this session. Governor Mike DeWine is suggesting that the new energy bill could roll back coal plant subsidies passed in HB 6, but did not give any indication whether it would bring back the efficiency that HB 6 repealed. As of the time of writing, no bills have been introduced or published on the legislature website.
We hope to see energy efficiency included in any energy package proposed this session. Maybe with a few changes in leadership and membership, the worst provisions, like the all-customer opt-out, won’t be necessary to ensure the votes to pass committee. The only certainty right now is that no one – policymakers, the commission, or the market – is doing enough right now to help regular Ohioans save energy.