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Regulatory Matters
 3 Months Ended
Mar. 31, 2022
Regulated Operations [Abstract]  
Regulatory Matters Regulatory Matters
Rate Plans
CECONY – Electric
In April 2022, CECONY updated its January 2022 request to the New York State Public Service Commission (NYSPSC) for an electric rate increase effective January 2023. The company decreased its requested January 2023 rate increase by $161 million to $1,038 million, decreased its illustrated January 2024 rate increase by $109 million to $744 million and increased its illustrated January 2025 rate increase by $7 million to $615 million.

CECONY – Gas
In April 2022, CECONY updated its January 2022 request to the NYSPSC for a gas rate increase effective January 2023. The company decreased its requested January 2023 rate increase by $101 million to $402 million, decreased its illustrated January 2024 rate increase by $29 million to $205 million and decreased its illustrated January 2025 rate increase by $42 million to $176 million.

CECONY - Electric and Gas
Pursuant to its electric and gas rate plans, CECONY recorded $92 million of earnings for the year ended December 31, 2021 of earnings adjustment mechanisms and positive incentives, primarily reflecting the achievement of certain energy efficiency measures. For the three months ended March 31, 2022, CECONY recorded a reduction in the amount of previously recorded earnings adjustment mechanisms of $4.5 million.

O&R NY - Electric and Gas
In April 2022, the NYSPSC approved the October 2021 joint proposal for new electric and gas rates. The joint proposal provides for electric rate increases of $4.9 million, $16.2 million and $23.1 million, effective January 1, 2022, 2023 and 2024, or $11.7 million on a levelized annual billed basis, respectively. The joint proposal provides for gas rate increases of $0.7 million, $7.4 million and $9.9 million, effective January 1, 2022, 2023 and 2024, or $4.4 million on a levelized annual billed basis, respectively. The joint proposal also includes certain COVID-19 provisions, such as: recovery of 2020 late payment charges over three years ($2.8 million); reconciliation of late payment charges to amounts reflected in rates for years 2021 through 2024, with full recovery/refund via surcharge/sur-credit once the annual variance equals or exceeds 5 basis points of return on equity; and reconciliation of write-offs of customer accounts receivable balances to amounts reflected in rates from January 1, 2020 through December 31, 2024, with full recovery/refund via surcharge/sur-credit once the annual variance equals or exceeds 5 basis points of return on equity.

Rockland Electric Company (RECO)
Effective July 2021, the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (NJBPU) authorized a conservation incentive program for RECO, that covers all residential and most commercial customers, under which RECO’s actual electric distribution revenues are compared with the authorized distribution revenues and the difference accrued, with interest, for refund to, or recovery from, customers, as applicable. The conservation incentive program is not permitted if RECO’s actual return on equity exceeds the approved base rate filing return on equity by 50 basis points or more.

In January 2022, RECO filed a request with FERC for an increase to its annual transmission revenue requirement from $16.9 million to $20.4 million. The revenue requirement reflects a return on common equity of 11.04 percent and a common equity ratio of 47 percent.

In March 2022, RECO filed a request with the NJBPU to implement a $209 million Infrastructure Investment Program (IIP) over a five-year period (2023 – 2027). RECO’s IIP proposes accelerated infrastructure investments to enhance safety, reliability, and/or resiliency.

COVID-19 Regulatory Matters
Governors, public utility commissions and other regulatory agencies in the states in which the Utilities operate have issued orders related to the COVID-19 pandemic that impact the Utilities as described below.

NY Regulation
In March 2020, former New York State Governor Cuomo declared a State Disaster Emergency for the State of NY due to the COVID-19 pandemic and signed the "New York State on PAUSE" executive order that temporarily closed all non-essential businesses statewide. The former Governor then lifted these closures over time and ended the emergency declaration in June 2021. As a result of the emergency declaration, and due to economic conditions, the NYSPSC and the Utilities have worked to mitigate the potential impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Utilities, their customers and other stakeholders.
In March 2020, the Utilities began suspending service disconnections, certain collection notices, final bill collection agency activity, new late payment charges and certain other fees for all customers. The Utilities also began providing payment extensions for all customers that were scheduled to be disconnected prior to the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. In June 2020, the state of NY enacted a law prohibiting NY utilities, including CECONY and O&R, from disconnecting residential customers, and starting in May 2021 small business customers, during the COVID-19 state of emergency, which ended in June 2021. In addition, such prohibitions were in effect until December 21, 2021 for residential and small business customers who experienced a change in financial circumstances due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In November 2021, the NYSPSC issued an order establishing a surcharge recovery mechanism for CECONY to collect, commencing December 1, 2021 through December 31, 2022, $43 million and $7 million for electric and gas, respectively, of late payment charges and fees that were not billed for the year ended December 31, 2020. The company recorded such amounts as revenue for the year ended December 31, 2021, as permitted under the accounting rules for regulated utilities, and also accrued such amounts as a current asset at December 31, 2021. Pursuant to the November 2021 order, the company also established a recovery mechanism for CECONY to collect, commencing January 2023 through December 2023, $19 million and $4 million for electric and gas, respectively, of late payment charges and fees that were not billed for the year ended December 31, 2021 and the company recorded such amounts as revenue for the year ended December 31, 2021, as permitted under the accounting rules for regulated utilities, and also accrued such amounts as a current asset at December 31, 2021. In addition, pursuant to the November 2021 order, CECONY established a reserve of $7 million toward addressing customer arrearages for the year ended December 31, 2021. The order also established a surcharge recovery or surcredit mechanism for any late payment charges and fee deferrals, subject to offsetting related savings resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, for 2022 starting in January of 2024 over a twelve-month period. CECONY resumed late payment charges for commercial and residential customers who have not experienced a change in financial circumstances due to the COVID-19 pandemic on September 3, 2021 and October 1, 2021, respectively. Pursuant to the October 2021 joint proposal for new electric and gas rates for O&R that was approved by the NYSPSC in April 2022. O&R recorded late payment charges and fees that were not billed for the years ended December 31, 2020 and December 31, 2021 of $1.7 million and $2.4 million, respectively, as revenue for the year ended December 31, 2021, as permitted under the accounting rules for regulated utilities, and also accrued such amounts as a current asset at December 31, 2021. See “Rate Plans,” above. O&R resumed late payment charges for commercial and residential customers who have not experienced a change in financial circumstances due to the COVID-19 pandemic on October 1, 2021.
The Utilities’ NY rate plans allow them to defer costs resulting from a change in legislation, regulation and related actions that have taken effect during the term of the rate plans once the costs exceed a specified threshold. The total reserve increases to the allowance for uncollectible accounts from January 1, 2020 through March 31, 2022 reflecting the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic for CECONY electric and gas operations and O&R electric and gas operations were $260 million and $6 million, respectively, and were deferred pursuant to the legislative, regulatory and related actions provisions of the rate plans as a result of the New York State on PAUSE and related executive orders, that have since been lifted, as described above. The Utilities’ NY rate plans also provide for an allowance for write-offs of customer accounts receivable balances. The above amounts deferred pursuant to the legislative, regulatory and related actions provisions were reduced by the amount that the actual write-offs of customer accounts receivable balances were below the allowance reflected in rates which differences were $1 million and $3 million for CECONY and O&R, respectively, from March 1, 2020 through March 31, 2022.

In June 2020, the NYSPSC directed CECONY to implement a summer cooling credit program to help mitigate the cost of staying home and operating air conditioning for health-vulnerable low-income customers due to the limited availability of public cooling facilities as a result of the COVID-19 social distancing measures. The $63.4 million cost of the program is being recovered over a five-year period that began January 2021.
In April 2021, NY passed a law that creates a program that allows eligible residential renters in NY who require assistance with rent and utility bills to have up to twelve months of electric and gas utility bill arrears forgiven, provided that such arrears were accrued on or after March 13, 2020. The program will be administered by the State Office of Temporary Disability Assistance (OTDA) in coordination with the NYSDPS. Under the program, CECONY and O&R qualify for a refundable tax credit for NY gross-receipts tax equal to the amount of arrears waived by the Utilities in the year that the arrears are waived and certified by the NYSPSC. OTDA may also use the program funds to provide additional Home Energy Assistance Program payments to the Utilities on behalf of low-income customers. For the three months ended March 31, 2022, CECONY received $5.9 million in payments from OTDA. In April 2022, CECONY received additional payments of $13.7 million and qualified for tax credits of $12.2 million to reduce customer accounts receivable balances. O&R has not received any payments from OTDA to date and an immaterial amount of tax credits. The total amount that may be allocated to CECONY and O&R under this program to address customer arrearages is not yet known.

In April 2022, NY approved the 2022-2023 state budget, which includes $250 million for addressing residential statewide utility arrears accrued from March 7, 2020 through March 1, 2022. Funds are expected to be distributed by the NYSDPS to NY utilities on behalf of customers. The allocation of funds to NY utilities, including CECONY and O&R, is to be based on their share of statewide eligible utility arrears of customers participating in energy affordability programs, and funds are expected to be disbursed no later than August 1, 2022.

In May 2021, CECONY and O&R, along with other large NY utilities, submitted joint comments to the NYSDPS' February 2021 report on New York State’s Energy Affordability Policy. The report recommends, among other things, that residential and commercial customers’ late payment fees and interest on deferred payment agreements be waived until two years after the expiration of the New York State moratorium on utility terminations (the moratorium expired on December 21, 2021) and each utility develop an arrears management program to mitigate the financial burdens of the COVID-19 pandemic on NY households and that program costs be shared, perhaps equally, between shareholders and customers. The May 2021 joint comments stated that it is not necessary for the NYSPSC to adopt the report’s COVID-19 related recommendations because New York State already passed laws that address the issues in the report, as described above.

The Utilities’ rate plans have revenue decoupling mechanisms in their NY electric and gas businesses that largely reconcile actual energy delivery revenues to the authorized delivery revenues approved by the NYSPSC per month and reconcile the deferred balances semi-annually under CECONY's electric rate plan (January through June and July through December, respectively) and annually under CECONY's gas rate plan and O&R's NY electric and gas rate plans (January through December). Differences are accrued with interest each month for CECONY's and O&R's NY electric customers and after the annual deferral period ends for CECONY's and O&R's NY gas customers for refund to, or recovery from customers, as applicable. Generally, the refund to or recovery from customers begins August and February of each year over an ensuing six-month period for CECONY's electric customers and February of each year over an ensuing twelve-month period for CECONY's gas and O&R's NY electric and gas customers.

NJ Regulation
In March 2020, NJ Governor Murphy declared a Public Health Emergency and State of Emergency for the State of NJ. In June 2021, the Governor ended the emergency declaration. As a result of the emergency declaration, and due to economic conditions, the NJBPU and RECO have worked to mitigate the potential impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on RECO, its customers and other stakeholders. In March 2020, RECO began suspending late payment charges, terminations for non-payment, and no access fees during the COVID-19 pandemic. The suspension of these fees continued through July 31, 2021 and were not material.

In July 2020, the NJBPU authorized RECO and other NJ utilities to create a COVID-19-related regulatory asset by deferring prudently incurred incremental costs related to the COVID-19 pandemic beginning on March 9, 2020, and has extended such deferrals through December 31, 2022. RECO deferred net incremental COVID-19 related costs of $0.8 million through March 31, 2022.

Gas Safety
In April 2020, the NYSPSC issued an order that extended the deadlines to complete certain gas inspections by all New York gas utilities, including CECONY and O&R, from April 1, 2020 to August 1, 2020. The deadlines were subsequently extended to September 2, 2020 and June 1, 2022, and CECONY and O&R have taken all reasonable measures to complete such inspections.
Other Regulatory Matters
In August 2018, the NYSPSC ordered CECONY to begin on January 1, 2019 to credit the company's electric and gas customers, and to begin on October 1, 2018 to credit its steam customers, with the net benefits of the federal Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (TCJA) as measured based on amounts reflected in its rate plans prior to the enactment of the TCJA in December 2017. The net benefits include the revenue requirement impact of the reduction in the corporate federal income tax rate to 21 percent, the elimination for utilities of bonus depreciation and the amortization of excess deferred federal income taxes.
CECONY, under its electric rate plan that was approved in January 2020, is amortizing its TCJA net benefits prior to January 1, 2019 allocable to its electric customers ($377 million) over a three-year period, the IRS “protected” portion of its net regulatory liability for future income taxes related to certain accelerated tax depreciation benefits allocable to its electric customers ($1,663 million) over the remaining lives of the related assets and the remainder, or “unprotected” portion of the net regulatory liability allocable to its electric customers ($784 million) over a five-year period. CECONY, under its gas rate plan that was approved in January 2020, amortized TCJA net benefits prior to January 1, 2019 allocable to its gas customers ($63 million) over a two-year period, The protected portion of its net regulatory liability for future income taxes allocable to its gas customers ($725 million) is being amortized over the remaining lives of the related assets and the unprotected portion of the net regulatory liability allocable to its gas customers ($107 million) over a five-year period.
CECONY’s net regulatory liability for future income taxes, including both the protected and unprotected portions, allocable to the company’s steam customers ($185 million) is being amortized over the remaining lives of the related assets (with the amortization period for the unprotected portion subject to review in its next steam rate proceeding).

O&R, under its current electric and gas rate plans, has reflected its TCJA net benefits in its electric and gas rates beginning as of January 1, 2019. Under the rate plans, O&R amortized its net benefits prior to January 1, 2019 ($22 million) over a three-year period. The protected portion of its net regulatory liability for future income taxes ($123 million) is being amortized over the remaining lives of the related assets). Pursuant to the October 2021 Joint Proposal, O&R will amortize the remaining unprotected portion of its net regulatory liability for future income taxes ($34 million) over a six-year period beginning January 1, 2022.

In January 2018, the NYSPSC issued an order initiating a focused operations audit of the Utilities’ financial accounting for income taxes. The audit is investigating the Utilities’ inadvertent understatement of a portion, the amount of which may be material, of their calculation of total federal income tax expense for ratemaking purposes. The understatement was related to the calculation of plant retirement-related cost of removal. As a result of such understatement, the Utilities accumulated significant income tax regulatory assets that were not reflected in O&R’s rate plans prior to 2014, CECONY’s electric and gas rate plans prior to 2015 and 2016, respectively, and is currently not reflected in CECONY’s steam rate plan. This understatement of historical income tax expense materially reduced the amount of revenue collected from the Utilities' customers in the past. As part of the audit, the Utilities plan to pursue a private letter ruling from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) that is expected to confirm, among other things, that in order to comply with IRS normalization rules, such understatement may not be corrected through a write-down of a portion of the regulatory asset and must be corrected through an increase in future years’ revenue requirements. The regulatory asset ($1,165 million and $25 million for CECONY and O&R, respectively, as of March 31, 2022) and ($1,176 million and $26 million for CECONY and O&R, respectively, as of December 31, 2021) is netted against the future income tax regulatory liability on the Companies’ consolidated balance sheet. The Utilities are unable to estimate the amount or range of their possible loss, if any, related to this matter. At March 31, 2022, the Utilities had not accrued a liability related to this matter.

In October 2020, the NYSPSC issued an order instituting a proceeding to consider requiring NY’s large, investor-owned utilities, including CECONY and O&R, to annually disclose what risks climate change poses to their companies, investors and customers going forward. The order notes that some holding companies, including Con Edison, already disclose climate change risks at the holding company level, but states that the NYSPSC believes that climate-related risk disclosures should be issued specific to the operating companies in NY, such as CECONY and O&R, and that such climate-related risk disclosures should be included annually with the utilities’ financial reports. In December 2020, CECONY and O&R, along with other large NY utilities, filed comments supporting climate change risk disclosures in annual reports filed with the NYSPSC and recommended the use of an industry-specific template.

In May 2020, the president of the United States issued the "Securing the United States Bulk-Power System" executive order, which has since expired. The executive order declared threats to the bulk-power system by foreign adversaries constitute a national emergency and prohibits the acquisition, importation, transfer or installation of certain bulk-power system electric equipment that is sourced from foreign adversaries. In April 2021 and November
2021, the Department of Energy (DOE) issued requests for information to: (1) assist the DOE in developing additional orders and/or regulations to secure the United States’ critical electric infrastructure and (2) enable the DOE to perform an energy sector supply chain review. In September 2021, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the National Institute of Standards and Technology issued preliminary cybersecurity goals for critical infrastructure control systems, with final goals to be issued by September 2022. The Companies are unable to predict the impact on them of any orders or regulations that may be adopted regarding critical infrastructure.

In July 2021, the NYSPSC approved a settlement agreement among CECONY, O&R and the NYSDPS that fully resolves all issues and allegations that have been raised or could have been raised by the NYSPSC against CECONY and O&R with respect to: (1) the July 2018 rupture of a CECONY steam main located on Fifth Avenue and 21st Street in Manhattan (the “2018 Steam Incident”); (2) the July 2019 electric service interruptions to approximately 72,000 CECONY customers on the west side of Manhattan and to approximately 30,000 CECONY customers primarily in the Flatbush area of Brooklyn (the “2019 Manhattan and Brooklyn Outages”); (3) the August 2020 electric service interruptions to approximately 330,000 CECONY customers and approximately 200,000 O&R customers following Tropical Storm Isaias (the “Tropical Storm Isaias Outages”) and (4) the August 2020 electric service interruptions to approximately 190,000 customers resulting from faults at CECONY’s Rainey substation following Tropical Storm Isaias (the “Rainey Outages”). Pursuant to the settlement agreement, CECONY and O&R agreed to a total settlement amount of $75.1 million and $7.0 million, respectively. CECONY and O&R agreed to forgo recovery from customers of $25 million and $2.5 million, respectively, associated with the return on existing storm hardening assets beginning with the next rate plan for each utility (over a period of 35 years). CECONY and O&R also agreed to incur ongoing operations and maintenance costs of up to $15.8 million and $2.9 million, respectively, for, among other things, costs to maintain a certain level of contractor and vehicle storm emergency support and storm preparation audits. For CECONY, the settlement agreement included previously incurred or accrued costs of $34.3 million, including negative revenue adjustments of $5 million for the Rainey Outages and $15 million for the 2019 Manhattan and Brooklyn Outages and $14.3 million in costs to reimburse customers for food and medicine spoilage and other previously incurred expenses related to Tropical Storm Isaias and the 2018 Steam Incident. For O&R, the settlement agreement included previously incurred costs of $1.6 million to reimburse customers for food and medicine spoilage and other expenses related to the Tropical Storm Isaias Outages.
Regulatory Assets and Liabilities
Regulatory assets and liabilities at March 31, 2022 and December 31, 2021 were comprised of the following items:
 
  
         Con Edison        CECONY
(Millions of Dollars)2022202120222021
Regulatory assets
Environmental remediation costs$933$938$854$860
Pension and other postretirement benefits deferrals447496392435
Revenue taxes409395391378
System peak reduction and energy efficiency programs330285329284
COVID-19 pandemic deferrals304282297277
Deferred storm costs292276178158 
Property tax reconciliation178202178202
MTA power reliability deferral128140128140
Unrecognized pension and other postretirement costs11212889110
Deferred derivative losses - long term85518045
Municipal infrastructure support costs41444144
Brooklyn Queens demand management program34363436
Meadowlands heater odorization project29292929
Non-wire alternative projects23232323
Preferred stock redemption20202020
Unamortized loss on reacquired debt14161314
Recoverable REV demonstration project costs14161315
Gate station upgrade project 14141414
Other273248248232
Regulatory assets – noncurrent3,6803,6393,3513,316
Deferred derivative losses - short term177141165133
Recoverable energy costs1126510455
Regulatory assets – current289206269188
Total Regulatory Assets$3,969$3,845$3,620$3,504
Regulatory liabilities
Future income tax$1,931$1,984$1,790$1,840
Allowance for cost of removal less salvage1,2151,1991,0461,033
Unrecognized pension and other postretirement costs23132199 — 
Net unbilled revenue deferrals131209131209
Pension and other postretirement benefit deferrals1081026355
Deferred derivative gains - long term106619655
Net proceeds from sale of property 9510394103
TCJA net benefits* 9212591123
System benefit charge carrying charge72706463
Property tax refunds35353535
Sales and use tax refunds30172916
BQDM and REV Demo reconciliations25252222
Earnings sharing - electric, gas and steam13131010
Settlement of gas proceedings10121012
Workers' compensation108108
Energy efficiency portfolio standard unencumbered funds615719 
Settlement of prudence proceeding6666
Other387365331312
Regulatory liabilities – noncurrent4,5034,3814,0343,921
Deferred derivative gains - short term480142443132
Refundable energy costs5032192
Revenue decoupling mechanism1311— — 
Regulatory liabilities – current543185462134
Total Regulatory Liabilities$5,046$4,566$4,496$4,055
* See "Other Regulatory Matters," above.

In general, the Utilities receive or are being credited with a return at the Other Customer-Provided Capital rate for regulatory assets that have not been included in rate base, and receive or are being credited with a return at the pre-tax weighted average cost of capital once the asset is included in rate base. Similarly, the Utilities pay to or
credit customers with a return at the Other Customer-Provided Capital rate for regulatory liabilities that have not been included in rate base, and pay to or credit customers with a return at the pre-tax weighted average cost of capital once the liability is included in rate base. The Other Customer-Provided Capital rate for the three months ended March 31, 2022 and 2021 was 1.75 percent and 1.80 percent, respectively.

In general, the Utilities are receiving or being credited with a return on their regulatory assets for which a cash outflow has been made ($1,983 million and $1,962 million for Con Edison, and $1,777 million and $1,751 million for CECONY at March 31, 2022 and December 31, 2021, respectively). Regulatory assets of RECO for which a cash outflow has been made ($22 million and $25 million at March 31, 2022 and December 31, 2021, respectively) are not receiving or being credited with a return. RECO recovers regulatory assets over a period of up to four years or until they are addressed in its next base rate case in accordance with the rate provisions approved by the NJBPU. Regulatory liabilities are treated in a consistent manner.

Regulatory assets that represent future financial obligations and were deferred in accordance with the Utilities’ rate plans or orders issued by state regulators do not earn a return until such time as a cash outlay has been made. Regulatory liabilities are treated in a consistent manner. At March 31, 2022 and December 31, 2021, regulatory assets for Con Edison and CECONY that did not earn a return consisted of the following items:
Regulatory Assets Not Earning a Return*
                  Con Edison                CECONY
(Millions of Dollars)2022202120222021
Unrecognized pension and other postretirement costs$112$128$89$110
Environmental remediation costs922928843850
Revenue taxes388375372359
COVID-19 Deferral for Uncollectible Accounts Receivable265236258231
Deferred derivative losses - current177141165134
Deferred derivative losses - long term85518045
Other37243624
Total$1,986$1,883$1,843$1,753
*This table presents regulatory assets not earning a return for which no cash outlay has been made.
The recovery periods for regulatory assets for which a cash outflow has not been made and that do not earn a return have not yet been determined, except as noted below, and are expected to be determined pursuant to the Utilities’ future rate plans to be filed or orders issued by the state regulators in connection therewith.
The Utilities recover unrecognized pension and other postretirement costs over 10 years, and the portion of investment gains or losses recognized in expense over 15 years, pursuant to NYSPSC policy.
The deferral for revenue taxes represents the New York State metropolitan transportation business tax surcharge on the cumulative temporary differences between the book and tax basis of assets and liabilities of the Utilities, as well as the difference between taxes collected and paid by the Utilities to fund mass transportation. The Utilities recover the majority of the revenue taxes over the remaining book lives of the electric and gas plant assets, as well as the steam plant assets for CECONY.
The Utilities recover deferred derivative losses – current within one year, and noncurrent generally within three years.