Central Maine Power's effort to raise electric rates in Maine has entered a new phase: regulators are demanding financial documents from the utility's parent company, Iberdrola.
For customers already struggling with high electricity bills, the move could provide a clearer picture of whether the company's requested profit levels are actually justified.
What happened?
In an order issued Aug. 5, the Maine Public Utilities Commission told CMP to provide internal Iberdrola records showing how the parent company figures the returns it expects from its U.S. utility investments, Bangor Daily News reported.
At the center of the case is CMP's proposal to raise distribution rates, which would add an average of $18 per month to residential bills and increase the company's allowed return on equity from 9.35% to 9.8%.
CMP Ratepayers Unite, a group opposing the increase, requested the records after its expert, former Sempra executive Mark Ellis, said that Iberdrola's 2025 annual financial report listed a 6.26% discount rate for the company's U.S. electric and gas assets, including CMP.
Seth Berry, a former Democratic state legislator and current head of the nonprofit Our Power, said, "This appears to be the first time that any multinational corporation in the U.S. has been forced in a rate case to divulge its own internal math."
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Why does it matter?
Utility rate cases determine how much customers pay each month and how much profit a utility is allowed to earn.
The disagreement is also a test of how transparent a monopoly utility and its parent company must be in a rate proceeding. CMP said the Iberdrola analysis was "an entirely unrelated accounting exercise," and Sarah Tracy of Pierce Atwood, who represents CMP, said the analysis concerned existing assets rather than future investments.
However, Peter Murray, an attorney representing CMP Ratepayers Unite, said the documents could show how Iberdrola itself views the investment risk tied to CMP. "There's no number that's been produced so far that's more relevant in this proceeding than CMP's parent's own analysis of the economic risk posed by this investment," Murray said.
What's being done?
The commission's presiding officer, Nora Healy, rejected CMP's objection and ordered the documents produced, while allowing some material to remain confidential under a protective order. That gives regulators and intervenors a chance to weigh CMP's public rate request against Iberdrola's internal assumptions.
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Other intervenors are also calling for closer scrutiny. Rebecca Schultz of the Natural Resources Council of Maine, a climate and clean energy advocate, said state law requires utility returns to reflect the actual cost of attracting investors.
"What CMP will now be forced to make public are Iberdrola's internal documents, offering a glimpse of what CMP's owners estimate its cost of capital to be," Schultz said.
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