And electric bills in the new year are reflecting those lower temperatures.
“The bill you receive in January reflects the electricity you used in December, and December had several very cold days,” Dayton electric service provider AES Ohio said on Facebook recently. “When temperatures drop, your heating system has to work longer to keep your home warm. That added runtime increases energy use.”
“It’s typical we hear more from customers in both the winter and summer months when the heat and A/C are working hard,” said Matt Schilling, a spokesman for the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO), which regulates Ohio utilities like AES Ohio and other companies.
At least two factors are at work here, Schilling said.
- Higher usage, driven by (again) last month’s colder weather.
- A recent distribution rate increase for AES Ohio customers. Recall that the PUCO voted in November to ratify a settlement that saw AES Ohio electric bills for customers using 1,000 kilowatt-hours of energy monthly rise by 9%.
Here was the message the PUCO included in customers’ November 2025 bills: “The rates contained in this bill were updated to reflect changes to the base distribution rates approved by the PUCO (Case No. 24-1009-EL-AIR) ... . These changes reflect an increase of $16.50 for a residential customer using 1,000 kWh per month, effective Nov. 6, 2025.”
All of this has been cold consolation for some, however.
“Why is my bill $800 for a two-bedroom apartment this month???” Facebook user Kay Holden asked AES Ohio. “I’m hardly home. Make it make sense.”
“Usage went up, but so did everything else on the bill,” wrote another Facebook user, Andrew Collins.
AES Ohio was once known as Dayton Power & Light. The company has 530,000 customers in west central Ohio, with than 1,600 miles of transmission lines, 13,000 miles of overhead distribution lines, 4,500 miles of underground distribution lines and 160 substations feeding 490 distribution circuits.
This PUCO website may help you begin to make sense of your bill. The site breaks down typical bills from Ohio electric companies.
Click the blue button titled “bill calculator,” and you can enter your usage for any given month and see the bill breakdown, Schilling suggested.
And get ready for next month’s bills. January has been cold, too. This weekend’s Dayton-area high temperatures are forecast to range from 32 degrees Saturday, down to 23 degrees Sunday — and all of 18 degrees Monday.
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