Houston Commercial Electricity Rates Run Highest at 7.71 Cents, Week of Aug 24, 2026

Updated weekly. Houston commercial electricity rates ran highest in Texas this week: CenterPoint plans averaged $0.0771 per kWh, against $0.0722 in Oncor (Dallas-Fort Worth). Across all 6,848 tracked competitive ERCOT commercial plans in the texascommercialplans.com database, the TxCP Commercial Rate Index (TCRI) rose 1.8 percent to $0.0743 per kWh from $0.0730 the prior week. Matched plan for plan, 1,462 plans changed price between weekly snapshots, about 21 percent of the catalog, with 892 moving down and 558 moving up, while 227 new plans came online and 21 were withdrawn. Mid-term contracts held the lowest average pricing. Data as of August 24, 2026. For the following week, see the August 31 weekly report.

Market Pulse

The average rose more than individual prices did this week. Across the roughly 6,800 ERCOT commercial plans in our proprietary texascommercialplans.com database, the TxCP Commercial Rate Index climbed 1.8 percent to $0.0743 per kWh, yet among the plans that changed price, more moved down (892) than up (558), so read the higher average alongside the mix of plans in the catalog rather than as a broad price increase. Mid-term contracts (roughly 13 to 24 months) held the lowest average at $0.0670 per kWh, undercutting both short-term and long-term averages, which is where a buyer's leverage sits right now.

What Moved This Week and Why It Matters

The most consequential development for Texas commercial buyers this week was ERCOT's public disclosure that it undershot its planned summer reserve purchases by about 3.7 gigawatts due to an internal modeling error. The grid held through record summer demand, and ERCOT will not backfill the shortfall for the rest of 2026, but the operator confirmed it is reviewing a stricter reserve standard for 2027 that could raise costs. For any commercial buyer sitting on a contract that expires in the next 12 months, the 2027 reserve conversation is now the single most important pricing signal to track.

What Happened

ERCOT bought about 3.7 GW less summer reserve capacity than its own planning target called for, the result of an internal modeling mistake, according to reporting from The Dallas Morning News republished in mid-August 2026. The grid still cleared record summer demand without emergency alerts, so operationally the shortfall was invisible. Financially it is not. ERCOT confirmed it will not attempt to make up the missing reserves through the balance of 2026 and is separately reviewing a stricter reserve standard for 2027 through its normal Public Utility Commission of Texas and ERCOT stakeholder processes. Higher reserve requirements flow through to wholesale prices tracked by the U.S. Energy Information Administration, and eventually to what Retail Electric Providers can offer on fixed commercial contracts.

Impact on Texas Commercial Buyers

Contract timing shifts. A stricter 2027 reserve standard is a price-raising signal, not a price-easing one, and it lands at the same time the ERCOT summer 2027 futures curve is already elevated. Buyers whose contracts expire in the first half of 2027 are now signing into a market that has to price in both actual reliability improvements and a policy path toward higher reserves. Locking earlier, into 2026 pricing, is a more defensible position than it was a month ago.

Budget exposure widens. A commercial buyer running a 24-month renewal cycle will re-solicit inside the 2027 pricing window. If the reserve standard tightens as ERCOT has signaled, the same load profile could see meaningfully higher fixed-rate quotes in that solicitation than the equivalent quote today. The immediate impact is not on this week's bill, it is on next year's contract math.

Reliability posture holds. The grid delivered through the summer without an EEA alert, which supports the case that operational reliability is intact even under the miss. Buyers should not read the shortfall as a reliability warning, they should read it as a cost warning.

The ERCOT 2027 Contract Timing Test

A named decision framework a buyer can carry into the next renewal conversation.

When does the current contract expire? If the term end falls between January and September 2027, the reserve rulemaking timeline lands squarely inside your pricing window.
What is the load's exposure to summer peaks? Loads with heavy June through September consumption pay more of the reserve cost pass-through than flat-load buyers, so they benefit more from locking earlier.
Is there capacity in the current REP to extend? Some Retail Electric Providers will blend a mid-term extension at today's pricing rather than a full re-quote at 2027 pricing.
What is the alternative to signing? A hold-over pass-through rate under a lapsed contract is almost always the worst possible outcome, and it is exactly what tightens under a stricter reserve regime.

What You Should Do This Week

Pull every commercial account with a contract expiration between January 1, 2027 and September 30, 2027, and rank them by annual kWh.
Request a re-quote from your incumbent REP for a 12-month, 24-month, and 36-month term today, so you have a written August 2026 price benchmark before the 2027 reserve conversation moves further.
Ask your REP whether it will honor a mid-term extension at current pricing, in writing, for accounts whose current term still has 4 to 9 months remaining.
Set a calendar reminder for the PUCT open meeting agenda in October 2026, which is the practical next window where the 2027 reserve standard is likely to surface.
Model a downside scenario at plus 8 to 12 percent on your 2027 blended rate for internal budgeting, and share it with finance before Q4 planning closes.

Questions to ask your REP or broker this week:

What is your current view on the 2027 ERCOT reserve rulemaking and how are you pricing it into forward quotes?
Will you honor a mid-term extension at today's rate for accounts inside 6 months of renewal?
How does the incumbent's holdover rate compare to a signed 12-month extension, in cents per kWh?

Also moving

ENGIE and QTS signed a 48 MWac solar PPA supplying QTS data centers in Irving, Texas. The deal is tied to ABEI Energy's Lubio Solar project in Kaufman County, expected to generate about 150 GWh annually. Non-data-center commercial buyers should read this as one more marginal MW of load contracted around the grid rather than through the grid, which is a slow tailwind for competitive commercial rates. Utility Dive coverage of Texas PPAs tracks the broader trend.
PUCT SB 6 large-load interconnection rulemaking continues. The commission's March 2026 vote to publish draft rules for 75 MW-and-above loads is still working through the docket. It reallocates transmission cost recovery in ways that matter to any commercial buyer paying non-bypassable transmission charges. PUCT electric subrules.
PUCT Rule 25.475 renewal notice compliance remains a live audit target. The rule requires at least three written notices in the final third of a commercial contract, with a final notice at least 30 days before expiration. Buyers who let a contract lapse into holdover typically pay a materially higher rate, so tracking the notice trail matters.
ERCOT summer performance context. Wholesale prices, load, and system conditions can be tracked in real time via the ERCOT public grid dashboard, and cross-referenced with EIA Electric Power Monthly retail rate averages.

Pricing Trend Analysis

The TCRI rose 1.8 percent this week while the per-TDU spread stayed inside a familiar band. CenterPoint (Houston area) held the top of the range at a $0.0771 per kWh average, Oncor (Dallas-Fort Worth) held the bottom at $0.0722, and the remaining three territories clustered inside 40 basis points of each other. On the term axis, mid-term contracts pulled back further and are now the clearest pricing advantage on the board. For a longer view of how TDU territory and contract term shape a quote, see our Texas commercial electricity rates guide.

As of Aug 24, 2026	Plans	Low ($/kWh)	Median ($/kWh)	Avg ($/kWh)	High ($/kWh)
Oncor (DFW)	1,723	0.0438	0.0650	0.0722	0.2360
AEP North	1,067	0.0438	0.0676	0.0761	0.2030
AEP Central	1,485	0.0438	0.0678	0.0736	0.2120
TNMP	1,465	0.0438	0.0664	0.0740	0.2640
CenterPoint (Houston)	1,108	0.0438	0.0680	0.0771	0.2100
Short-term (all TDU)	2,656	0.0438	0.0616	0.0812	0.2640
Mid-term (all TDU)	1,729	0.0552	0.0635	0.0670	0.1609
Long-term (all TDU)	871	0.0456	0.0670	0.0708	0.1530

See the full pricing breakdown in our data download.

REP Spotlight: TXU Energy

TXU Energy carries 77 commercial plans across all five ERCOT TDU territories in our tracked catalog this week, with contract terms spanning 1 to 60 months. Positioning is above the market average on aggregate, meaning the incumbent's book skews toward premium pricing rather than the discount end of the field. TXU has one of the widest commercial term ranges of any Retail Electric Provider we track, which is meaningful for buyers who want a very short bridge product or a very long lock, both of which are underserved by mid-tier REPs. Publicly, TXU markets business-focused features including dedicated account management and multi-site aggregation, which sit alongside its retail brand-name recognition inside the Vistra portfolio.

Get this provider's full plan data in our data download.

Buyer Intelligence

Two questions dominate commercial buyer conversations this week. The first is whether it makes sense to lock a 2027-touching contract right now, given the ERCOT reserve news, and the second is whether the mid-term pricing advantage is real or an artifact of who filed new offers this week.

Should a Texas commercial buyer lock in a longer-term contract this week?

Based on this week's data across our tracked plans, buyers whose contracts touch calendar-year 2027 should get a written re-quote for 12, 24, and 36-month terms this week. The TCRI is up 1.8 percent week-over-week, mid-term contracts sit at $0.0670 per kWh (below both short and long averages), and the ERCOT 2027 reserve conversation is a price-raising signal rather than a price-easing one. A written August 2026 quote becomes the benchmark that any 2027 solicitation is compared against.

Are short-term contracts actually the cheapest right now?

No. Short-term contracts show the lowest median ($0.0616) but the highest average ($0.0812) across our 2,656 tracked short-term plans this week, because the segment carries the widest dispersion. That gap between median and average is the tell. A minority of short-term plans price at true bargain rates and the majority price at a premium to cover volatility risk. Mid-term contracts, with a $0.0670 average and much tighter dispersion, are the segment where the buyer's expected outcome is best.

Data Snapshot

Active tracked commercial plans: 6,848
TxCP Commercial Rate Index (TCRI): $0.0743 per kWh, up 1.8 percent week-over-week
Plans that changed price this week, matched plan for plan: 1,462 (892 down, 558 up)
New plans added this week: 227
Plans withdrawn this week: 21
Average contract term across tracked plans: 23.7 months
Highest-cost TDU territory (avg): CenterPoint at $0.0771 per kWh
Lowest-cost TDU territory (avg): Oncor at $0.0722 per kWh
Cheapest contract term segment (avg): Mid-term at $0.0670 per kWh

Full rate data, plan comparisons, and historical trends are available in our data download.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the average Texas commercial electricity rate this week?

The TxCP Commercial Rate Index sits at $0.0743 per kWh across the 6,848 commercial plans we track this week, up 1.8 percent from $0.0730 per kWh the prior week. That average is energy-only across competitive Retail Electric Providers, not a bundled EIA all-in figure.

Which TDU territory has the highest commercial electricity rates in August 2026?

CenterPoint, serving the Houston area, holds the highest average commercial rate at $0.0771 per kWh across 1,108 tracked plans. Oncor, serving Dallas-Fort Worth, holds the lowest average at $0.0722 per kWh across 1,723 plans. That is a 6.7 percent spread between the two largest metros.

Are short-term or long-term commercial electricity contracts cheaper right now?

Mid-term contracts, roughly 13 to 24 months, are the pricing sweet spot this week at a $0.0670 per kWh average across 1,729 plans. Short-term contracts average $0.0812 per kWh, which is a 21 percent premium, driven by wide dispersion and volatile prompt pricing. Long-term contracts land between the two at $0.0708 per kWh.