U.S. Commercial and Industrial Electricity Demand Charge Rates

This dataset lists maximum demand charge rates for U.S. commercial and industrial electricity tariffs, compiled from the Utility Rate Database. The data was manually transcribed from utility tariff sheets by NREL and is provided as a reference.

Use Cases

• Analyze demand charge rates across different utility tariffs to compare costs for commercial and industrial customers.
• Identify rate tier structures by examining the highest assumed rate tier for tariffs with multiple demand charge elements.
• Reference location-specific tariff data for energy analysis projects related to building efficiency or solar power integration.
• Study the relationship between demand charges and other tariff features documented in the Utility Rate Database.

Strengths

• Data originates from the authoritative Utility Rate Database managed by the Department of Energy.
• Includes manually interpreted rates for both the Commercial and Industrial sectors.
• Explicitly documents the methodology for calculating the maximum demand charge from complex tariff sheets.

Limitations

• Data is incomplete as not all U.S. tariffs are designed in a format suitable for the source database.
• Contains transcription errors from manual interpretation of complex utility documents.
• Tariffs may have changed since the list was developed, and many have additional restrictions not represented.

Provenance

Source

Utility Rate Database (https://openei.org/wiki/Utility_Rate_Database).

Collection Method

Manually interpreted and transcribed from utility tariff sheets.

Freshness

Last updated on 2026-03-21.

Geography

United States.