By Hannah Grover
A utility serving customers in southern New Mexico is asking state regulators to approve a small increase to a rate rider that will support bringing new renewable resources online.
El Paso Electric filed a plan with the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission on Friday outlining how it will reach the state-required 40% renewable energy targets in the upcoming years.
EPE serves customers in both New Mexico and Texas, including residents of Hatch and Las Cruces as well as the White Sands Missile Range and Holloman Air Force Base.
Under state law, investor-owned utilities like EPE are required to receive 40% of their electricity from renewable sources by this year and 50% by 2030.
The PRC has already approved a renewable energy portfolio for the utility. On top of the approved plan, EPE hopes to receive electricity from a 150 megawatt solar array known as the Santa Teresa Project, which also has a 150 megawatt battery storage facility. If approved by the PRC, EPE will receive all of the renewable energy generated by the Santa Teresa Project and a portion — 50 megawatts — of the storage capacity. This project will be built about five miles southwest of Santa Teresa.
The utility will purchase the electricity from the solar project for $28.95 a megawatt hour and will pay an estimated $12.95 a kilowatt month for the storage capacity. The final cost for the battery storage capacity will be determined in part by the price of lithium carbonate on the Shanghai Metals Market at the time that the material is delivered to the factory for construction.
The Santa Teresa Project will allow EPE to meet the 40% threshold in 2026. All of the energy from the Santa Teresa Project will be delivered to customers in the utility’s New Mexico service territory.
EPE is further requesting a small increase in its renewable portfolio standard rate rider on customers’ bills to pay for the new resources. The current rate rider is a little less than 1.6 cents per kilowatt hour. EPE is proposing increasing that to 2 cents per kilowatt hour, which is approximately a 28 percent increase in the rate rider.
For a residential customer who uses 750 kilowatt hours in a month, the current rate rider is $11.81. EPE’s proposal would increase the rate rider for that customer to $15.16. The rate rider is in addition to the base rate and fuel costs.
EPE has faced delays in the rollout of renewable energy projects, including the Carne Solar Project in the Deming area. This project was supposed to begin commercial operations this year, but now officials say it will likely begin providing EPE with electricity in late February 2026.
Earlier this year, EPE also learned that the Camino Real Landfill Gas to Energy Facility will no longer generate electricity. Camino Real was previously providing EPE with electricity generated from landfill gas using two 1.6 megawatt internal combustion engines. That means EPE cannot use the landfill to help meet renewable energy requirements.