in our Spotlight on Business Report tonight why your electric bills are going up depending on your provider average utility customers are paying an extra four to eight bucks a month Republicans have been laying blame on the state's expanded green energy efforts but as Ted Goldberg reports the real reason is a bit more complicated if you've noticed your electric bill jumping up over the last couple of months you're not alone you look at the low and moderate income person who and quite frankly even the middle class person their bill is becoming untenable I'm actually hopeful that we can have a bipartisan hearing on this issue State Senator Michael Tesa is calling for hearings into the Board of Public Utilities which has to approve any utility asking to raise rates the BPU approved increases of 3 to 8% for some of the biggest players in New Jersey electricity but some residents Statewide have seen much larger increases Senator Tesa lays the blame on the state's efforts to increase renewable energy former president of the BPU Fior deliso may he rest in peace you know was sitting there in our hearings with a windmill pin on his lapel and they're supposed to sit in a quasi judicial manner they're not supposed to make decisions ahead of time without any type of evidence or hearings for a few years now Governor Phil Murphy has pushed New Jersey to transition to Green energy to fight climate change Senator test says it might have taken this long for utility bills to reflect that pursuing wind as hard as they did I just don't think that they were mindful of the fact that rates were going to eventually go up Congressman Jeff Van Drew has also called for an investigation and mentioned offshore wind as a possible culprit others say higher utility bills aren't because of green energy they're because of an overreliance on fossil fuels this is a team sport again New Jersey is not an island we get our energy from across the region but we need to make sure the people that run our regional electric grid are actually looking into the future and realizing that we can't keep investing in fossil fuels environment NJ director Doug Ali says the regional power grid pjm which serves New Jersey and 12 other states should do more to lean on green energy make electricity cheaper to the New Jersey companies itself SS to and become more resilient we need to make that investment not just cuz it's good for the environment but because it's good for the grid since Sandy there's been a drive of investment and it's been massive investment you know we're talking billions with a V Brian Litman leads the division of rate Council which represents rate payers in cases when utilities want to raise rates he says some people could have higher bills because they're using more electricity during a record hot summer but there are other factors Regulators have allowed power companies to raise rates to recoup the costs of upgrading infrastructure back when Sandy started we were seeing facilities that were over 100 years old think about we're relying on our electric generation or electric power coming from a wire that was put in a 100 years ago in response to the story The BPU sent a statement which reads in part the cost of generating electricity has changed something that is not unique to New Jersey utilities purchase their electricity in the marketplace and there are different Market mechanisms that impact the cost of electricity after after a particularly hot and humid summer we encourage customers to compare their individual usage from month to month and year to year to determine if higher usage has caused an increase in their bill a little relief is coming early next year when New Jersey stops subsidizing nuclear power but that's only expected to save rate payers $70 a year for NJ Spotlight news I'm Ted Goldberg [Music]