CenterPoint Energy Secures Recovery for Storm Costs and Rate Adjustments
The Houston-based utility moves to amortize winter storm bad debt and securitize $1.1 billion in Hurricane Beryl restoration expenses.
CenterPoint Energy (CNP) focused its 2025 operational efforts on recovering massive storm-related expenditures and stabilizing its rate base through its primary Texas subsidiary, CenterPoint Energy Houston Electric, LLC (TX). Serving approximately 2.9 million metered customers via 67 retail electric providers, the utility navigated a complex regulatory environment to address both legacy weather events and recent catastrophic storm damage.
Regulatory recovery centered on a Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) final order that became effective April 28, 2025. This order initiated the five-year amortization of regulatory assets tied to bad debt and reimbursement costs stemming from the February 2021 Winter Storm Event. The company recorded regulatory assets of $7 million and $8 million for bad debt expenses resulting from retail electric provider defaults.
Storm restoration costs dominated the company's operational balance sheet. CenterPoint Houston reached a PUCT-approved settlement to recover $1.1 billion in distribution-related costs associated with Hurricane Beryl, a sum to be recovered through the issuance of securitization bonds. Additionally, a PUCT order dated April 24, 2025, authorized the recovery of $425 million in costs related to the May 2024 storm events, comprising $396 million in distribution and $29 million in transmission expenses.
Capital investment remained aggressive to support grid resilience. Total capital additions for the year reached $2.06 billion. The company's plant-in-service is heavily weighted toward the delivery side of the business, with distribution assets totaling $12.92 billion and transmission assets totaling $6.51 billion.
Revenue streams remained diversified across customer classes, with total operating revenues hitting $4.06 billion. Residential customers provided the largest share of this revenue at 45.4%, or $1.84 billion, followed by commercial and small customers at 27.2% ($1.11 billion) and industrial and large customers at 12.3% ($500.6 million).
On the operational front, the company managed its Temporary Emergency Electric Energy Facilities (TEEEF) to bolster regional reliability. This included a proposal in Docket 57980 to release 15 large TEEEF units to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) at City Public Service Energy facilities in San Antonio. Simultaneously, the company sought preapproval to lease 36 small TEEEF units, totaling approximately 20 MW of capacity, under 36-month terms.
CenterPoint now faces the execution of its securitization strategy to clear the $1.1 billion Beryl-related liability and the continued five-year rollout of its winter storm debt amortization.