FPL rates 2026: bill estimates and the AC paradox

Florida Power & Light is the largest US investor-owned utility by customer count, with more than 6 million accounts. The per-kWh rate is moderate (the official typical 1,000 kWh bill is $136.64, about 13.7 cents all-in) but monthly bills run high because Florida household consumption is roughly 28 percent above the US average, almost entirely from AC. This page covers RS-1 standard, RTR-1 time-of-day, storm cost recovery, and the realistic savings strategies given that FPL is a regulated monopoly with no supply shopping.

The FPL bill components, in detail

FPL residential bills break out into a base energy charge plus several cost-recovery clauses that adjust periodically based on actual costs incurred. The base energy charge is set in FPL's most recent base-rate case settlement, approved by the PSC in November 2025 and covering 2026 through 2029. The fuel cost recovery clause adjusts monthly with the cost of natural gas (FPL's primary fuel) and other generation inputs; this is the most volatile component, sometimes adding or subtracting 2 to 4 cents per kWh from the bill in a given month. The capacity cost recovery clause recovers the cost of building or contracting generation capacity. The environmental cost recovery clause recovers the cost of meeting state and federal environmental regulations. The conservation cost recovery clause recovers the cost of FPL's energy efficiency programs.

The all-in result from January 2026 is about 12.3 cents per kWh for the first 1,000 kWh in a month and about 14.3 cents for usage above that (the energy and fuel charges are both tiered at 1,000 kWh), which puts FPL's official typical 1,000 kWh bill at $136.64, up $2.50 from 2025. The monthly base charge ($10.52) is fixed regardless of usage, and accounts whose base electric service costs fall below $30 are billed a $30 minimum. Florida's state sales tax does not apply to residential electricity, though a state gross receipts tax of about 2.6 percent is built into the bill (unlike states such as New York that add city and state sales tax as separate line items).

Why Florida bills run high despite moderate rates

The Florida household paradox is that the per-kWh price sits below the US average while the monthly bill lands above it. EIA's 2024 residential figures (Table 5.A, from forms EIA-861) put Florida at 14.14 cents per kWh against a US average of 16.48 cents, about 14 percent below, yet Florida's average monthly bill is $156.09 against a US average of $142.26, about 10 percent above. The reconciliation is usage. The average Florida household buys about 1,104 kWh per month against a US average of 863 kWh, roughly 28 percent more. Florida ranks fifth among the states on that measure, not first: Louisiana (1,202 kWh), Mississippi (1,156), Tennessee (1,154) and Alabama (1,143) all consume more. The driver is almost entirely air conditioning: Florida has the longest cooling season in the US and homes typically run AC nine months of the year, peaking at 14 to 18 hours per day in July and August. FPL customers sit below the Florida average on price, at about 13.7 cents all-in for the first 1,000 kWh.

A 2,500 square foot home with a 4-ton central AC running 14 hours a day in July uses about 1,500 kWh per month just for the AC, on top of the 400 to 500 kWh for everything else (refrigerator, pool pump, lighting, hot water, electronics). At FPL's 2026 tiered rates, that produces roughly a $270 to $280 monthly bill. A 1,200 square foot apartment with a smaller AC system uses about 600 to 800 kWh per month in summer and produces an $85 to $115 bill. The variation across Florida households is enormous because the AC load varies enormously.

Practical FPL savings strategies for AC-dominated bills

For an AC-dominated bill, the savings opportunity concentrates on the AC system itself rather than on rate-plan optimisation (which is limited in a regulated state with no supply shopping). Five strategies that move the needle. First, raise the thermostat setpoint by 2 to 4 degrees during the day (78 to 80 instead of 74 to 76); each degree above 72 saves about 3 to 5 percent on cooling cost. Second, install a smart thermostat with occupancy and humidity sensing, which can save 10 to 20 percent of cooling cost through scheduling and adaptive control. Third, get a SEER2 rating audit of the existing AC system; because SEER is cooling output per unit of electricity, replacing a 13 SEER unit from 2005 with a modern 18 SEER unit cuts cooling kWh by about 28 percent on the ratings alone (1 minus 13/18), with a little more in practice because a twenty-year-old compressor no longer performs to its original rating. Fourth, add solar attic ventilation and consider radiant barrier in the attic; both reduce the heat load the AC has to fight.

Fifth, switch to RTR-1 time-of-day and shift the pool pump to overnight off-peak hours (a typical 1.5 hp variable-speed pump drawing about 1 kW for 8 hours overnight instead of through the weekday peak window saves about 21 cents on each shifted kWh at 2026 prices, roughly $35 per month in summer). Combined with shifting laundry and dishwasher to off-peak, RTR-1 cuts the bill meaningfully for households that genuinely shift load. The January 2026 rates widened the FPL TOU spread to roughly 4.5:1 (about 27 cents on-peak against about 6 cents off-peak), comparable to California's steepest TOU plans, so the stakes run larger in both directions: households with heavy unavoidable peak-window load can lose money on RTR-1.

Storm cost recovery and the long tail of hurricane bills

Florida hurricane history continues to shape FPL bills. The 2024 season alone (hurricanes Debby, Helene and Milton) left about $1.2 billion in restoration costs, plus $150 million to replenish FPL's storm reserve. The Florida Public Service Commission approves recovery of these costs through a temporary surcharge set in a specific docket after each major storm; the 2024-storm surcharge added $12.02 per month to a typical 1,000 kWh bill and ran from January through December 2025. Recovering over a tight 12-month window rather than several years reduces the chance of overlapping surcharges if new storms hit.

The 2024-storm surcharge expired in December 2025, and no ongoing storm restoration surcharge is active on FPL residential bills. It slightly over-collected: after a true-up the Florida PSC approved (July 2026) returning about $80 million to customers with interest, delivered as a one-time bill reduction of roughly $8 for a typical 1,000 kWh customer in September 2026 (FPL's September rate insert lists it as a Storm Restoration Recovery Refund of 0.797 cents per kWh). That refund is a one-time September adjustment, not an ongoing rate. What appears on every bill on a continuing basis is the separate storm protection cost recovery clause, 0.995 cents per kWh in 2026 (about $10 a month at 1,000 kWh), which funds grid hardening rather than post-storm repairs. FPL also maintains a storm reserve that absorbs the first portion of any new storm cost; a restoration surcharge is only triggered when costs exceed the reserve, so a new major hurricane would mean a fresh PSC docket and a new temporary surcharge.

Solar Together and net-metering in FPL territory

FPL operates two solar pathways for residential customers. SolarTogether is the community solar program: residential customers subscribe in 1 kW increments at a fixed $6.76 per kW per month, then receive a monthly bill credit based on their share of the energy the solar centers actually produce. FPL's own program FAQ sets out the terms plainly: no upfront cost, no long-term contract, cancel at any time without penalty, savings once accumulated credits exceed accumulated charges, and a subscription credit rate that rises 1.5 percent a year. Because the subscription charge is fixed while the credit rate escalates, the arithmetic improves the longer a subscriber stays in. FPL sells subscriptions across its service area first-come, first-served subject to availability, and operates a waitlist when none is free, so availability rather than price is usually the binding constraint.

For rooftop solar, FPL offers net metering at the standard residential rate up to a system size cap of 2 MW under Florida PSC rule 25-6.065. Florida's solar net-metering rules were the subject of contentious legislative debate in 2022; a proposed reduction to avoided-cost rates was vetoed and retail-rate net metering remains in effect for the state's investor-owned utilities. The payback maths changed sharply at the end of 2025: the 30 percent federal Residential Clean Energy Credit (Section 25D) was repealed early by the 2025 budget law and is not available for any installation completed after 31 December 2025, so a 2026 install in FPL territory carries no federal credit and pays the full system cost. Florida payback was already slower than in high-rate states because the retail rate it offsets is lower, and removing the credit stretches it further. Solar plus battery is becoming more common given hurricane resilience considerations; the battery does not improve the financial payback materially under current rules but adds backup power during outages.

FPL vs Duke Energy Florida vs the municipal utilities

FPL serves most of Florida's Atlantic coast from Daytona south to Miami, much of southwest Florida, and the northwest Panhandle, the last of which came from Gulf Power in the 2021 merger and is still rated separately as FPL's Northwest Division (the $136.64 typical bill above applies to most of Florida, not to the Northwest Division). Duke Energy Florida serves northern and central Florida including Orlando suburbs, Ocala and St. Petersburg. Tampa Electric (TECO) serves the Tampa Bay metro. JEA serves Jacksonville, OUC serves Orlando proper, and a network of municipal and cooperative utilities serves the rest. The Florida Keys are not FPL retail territory: Florida Keys Electric Cooperative serves the Upper and Middle Keys down to the Seven Mile Bridge and Keys Energy Services serves Key West and the Lower Keys, though FKEC buys nearly all of its wholesale power from FPL.

On the figures the utilities themselves publish, FPL is the cheapest of the three big Florida investor-owned utilities at 1,000 kWh. FPL's typical residential bill is $136.64 a month from January 2026, against $156.43 at Tampa Electric (15.64 cents per kWh, the level TECO has published since its temporary storm charge ended in August 2026). That puts FPL roughly 13 percent below Tampa Electric at the same usage. Duke Energy Florida has cut hard through 2026, lowering a typical 1,000 kWh residential bill by about $50 across three reductions from January to June as its own hurricane storm-cost charge came off, but Duke publishes those changes as deltas rather than an absolute monthly figure, so we do not quote a Duke bill level here. The municipal utilities (JEA, OUC, Tallahassee Utilities, Gainesville Regional Utilities) generally run at or below the IOU rates because they do not have to generate profits for shareholders. Customers cannot choose their utility (service territory is fixed by Florida PSC), so the comparison is mostly informational; if you are moving within Florida, the utility serving your destination address may produce a noticeably different bill at the same usage level.

Sources and further reading

• FPL rate schedules (residential rates insert, effective September 2026)
• Florida Public Service Commission (rate case docket 20250011-EI, storm cost recovery)
• FPL: one-time September 2026 storm-restoration refund ($80M true-up)
• FPL energy efficiency programs
• FPL solar programs and net metering
• FPL SolarTogether residential FAQ (subscription charge, credit rate, cancellation terms)
• EIA Table 5.A, residential average monthly bill by state (2024 data, forms EIA-861; Florida and US consumption, price and bill)
• Tampa Electric rates (TECO typical 1,000 kWh residential bill)
• IRS: Residential Clean Energy Credit (Section 25D, not available for property placed in service after 31 December 2025)
• Florida state electricity cost page
• Cost to run an air conditioner per hour
• Duke Energy rates (multi-state including Florida)
• How we source these numbers

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