Thanks to dropping natural gas prices and rising costs of electricity elsewhere, Connecticut no longer has the highest electricity rates in the continental United States, a dubious title the state has held since 2007.
In July, the average retail price of electricity rose to 17.89 cents per kilowatt hour in New York while the price dropped to 17.44 cents per kilowatt hour in Connecticut, according to the latest data released by the U.S. Energy Information Administration on Oct. 14.
Both states are still far from Hawaii, which has rates running at 25.3 cents per kilowatt hour.
Connecticut’s high electricity rates have been the subject of political and business turmoil, including during this year’s legislative session. Lawmakers passed an energy bill calling for a 15 percent reduction in the rate, but Gov. M. Jodi Rell vetoed the measure.
Because a large portion of the state’s energy supply uses natural gas, Connecticut has benefitted from the falling price of natural gas over the past two years. July’s natural gas price was 58 percent lower than July 2008’s price.
While Connecticut’s rising electricity prices have gotten some reprieve over the past two years, New York’s have climbed increasingly over the past five years. New York’s electricity prices rose  7 percent over July 2009 while Connecticut’s dropped 3 percent.
The average retail price paid for all of 2010 remains higher in Connecticut than New York, 17.52 cents per kilowatt hour compared to 16.35, but July’s figures mark the first time since 2007 that Connecticut wasn’t the second highest in the nation.
In 2007, Connecticut took over the title of highest in the continental United States from Massachusetts, a title that belonged to New York in 2005.
