From staff reports The U.S. Energy Information Agency (EIA) reports that 25 states, including Oklahoma, produce more electricity than they consume, so the excess gets sold to other states via utility-to-utility sales. And for states that import power, price is a key consideration.
The same EIA report showed that in 2023, Oklahoma was among those states with the cheapest electrical rates: 9.3 cents per kilowatt-hour. Rates in surrounding states included New Mexico (9.47 cents), Arkansas (9.73 cents), Texas (10.04 cents), Kansas (10.8 cents), Missouri (10.87 cents), and Colorado (11.76 cents).
North Dakota (8.03¢/kWh), Wyoming (8.39¢/kWh) and Louisiana(8.91¢/ kWh) were the lowest in the nation, while. Hawaii (38.6¢/kWh) was the highest, by far.
The next highest tier included California (24.87 cents), followed by Connecticut (24.24 cents), Massachusetts (23.21 cents), New Hampshire (22.96 cents), and Rhode Island (21.62 cents).
The U.S. average retail price per kilowatt-hour of electricity in 2023 was 12.68 cents, USEIA calculated.
Generators in Pennsylvania moved the most electricity outside state borders in 2023, with 83.4 million megawatt-hours (mWh) of power – 26% of the state’s total generation – shipped out. Utilities in Virginia imported the most electricity from other states in 2023, with 50.1 million mWh in net electricity interstate receipts, or 36% of the state’s total electricity supply.
For several years, California has been the nation’s top importer of electricity. That’s understandable, given its size and its growing aversion to fossil fuels. However, the EIA reported in December that California’s electricity imports have dropped while Virginia’s have risen, and Virginia now imports more electricity than any other state.
Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, in his recent State of the Commonwealth address, noted that, “We now import roughly 40% of our power needs versus 18% in 2020. Worse yet, the cost of that imported power is almost 10 times higher than it was just one year ago.”
And that’s significant because Virginia’s need to import energy coincides with the growth of data centers in that state. Virginia has the world’s largest data center market, most of which is dominated by four big tech companies: Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft.
The decrease in California is due to a combination of increased rooftop and net-metered solar installations and investment in energy efficiency programs. Rooftop solar capacity in California is greater than in any other state, and more utility-scale solar farm capacity is located there than in any other state. For example, the 16.6 gigawatts (GW) of rooftop solar capacity in California exceeds the 15.0 GW of utility-scale solar farms in Texas.
Up to the early 1950s, the United States produced most of the energy it consumed. U.S. energy consumption was higher than U.S. energy production for 60 years: every year from 1958 – 2018. The difference between consumption and production was met by imports, particularly crude oil and petroleum products such as motor gasoline and distillate fuel oil.
Total energy imports (based on heat content) peaked in 2007 and subsequently declined in nearly every year since then. Increases in U.S. crude oil and natural gas production reduced the need for crude oil and natural gas imports and contributed to increases in crude oil and natural gas exports.
The U.S. has been a net total energy exporter – total energy exports have been higher than total energy imports – since 2019.
Even though U.S. total energy imports increased by about 1% in 2023, U.S. total energy exports that year were the highest on record, at about 29.5 quadrillion British thermal units (quads), and increased by about 8% from 2022. Total energy exports exceeded total energy imports by about 7.8 quads, the largest annual margin on record.
In a related matter, the U.S. has been a net coal exporter since at least 1949. In 2023, annual U.S. coal exports increased by about 15% and equaled about 8% of total energy exports. U.S. coal imports decreased by about 35% and accounted for less than 1% of total U.S. energy imports that year.