Texas Commercial Electricity Market Report: Week of August 25-31, 2026

According to the TxCP Commercial Rate Index (TCRI), the market-average Texas commercial electricity rate across the 7,940 plans we track in our proprietary texascommercialplans.com database moved 1.3 percent higher week over week as of August 31, 2026, climbing from 7.24 cents to 7.33 cents per kWh across all five ERCOT deregulated TDU territories. Short-term contracts led the move at an aggregate average of 8.05 cents per kWh, roughly 23 percent above the mid-term band, while long-term fixed averages held near 7.03 cents per kWh across tracked Texas REPs.

Market Pulse

The weekly TCRI move reflects two forces reshaping the ERCOT commercial market at the same time. Wholesale forward curves are absorbing the reality that Texas data centers now dominate the interconnection queue, and Governor Greg Abbott's August 3 moratorium on new data center approvals is starting to reprice risk into fixed-rate offers from Texas REPs. Short-term contracts carry the highest average because those plans reprice most often, so any wholesale volatility flows through them first.

The TCRI captured a similar pattern across all five deregulated TDU territories, with the median commercial band running between 6.39 and 6.71 cents per kWh across Oncor, CenterPoint, AEP North, AEP Central and TNMP. That 5 percent territorial spread is narrower than the 23 percent term-length spread, which tells commercial shoppers a lot about where to focus a shopping cycle: the contract-length decision is currently a larger dollar lever than the TDU-territory decision.

What Moved This Week and Why It Matters

The single most consequential development for Texas commercial buyers this week is the widening gap between ERCOT's data center interconnection queue and the state's willingness to approve it. ERCOT is now tracking roughly 474 GW of large-load requests, close to 90 percent from data centers, at the same time Governor Abbott's August 3 moratorium is forcing a full audit of every project on that list before any new one moves forward. For a Texas SMB signing a 12 to 36 month fixed rate today, that regulatory pause has become a pricing variable, not a background story.

What Happened

ERCOT reported in its July 29 briefing to the Texas Senate that its large-load interconnection queue had reached record levels, with the vast majority of requested demand coming from data centers seeking to plug into the grid over the next several years (ERCOT Senate briefing). On August 3, Governor Greg Abbott ordered a moratorium on new data center interconnections and directed ERCOT and the PUCT to audit the roughly 474 GW of queued projects for energy and water usage (Utility Dive). Later in the month, ERCOT confirmed it plans to complete the governor's audit by December 10, 2026 (Utility Dive). The pause applies to large loads at or above 75 MW, so standard commercial facilities are not directly affected, but the audit's outcome will shape ERCOT's 2027 planning inputs.

Impact on Texas Commercial Buyers

Contract: Texas REPs pricing 24 to 36 month fixed contracts today are baking a wider forward-curve risk premium into offers, because the future demand picture is genuinely uncertain until the audit lands in December. That premium shows up as a spread between the mid-term and short-term bands in our data, and the short-term band widened this week to a 23 percent average premium over mid-term.

Budget: Transmission and ancillary charges will move if the audit reshapes ERCOT's 4CP planning assumptions for 2027. Commercial buyers who already hedged summer 4CP exposure this year avoid the worst of that, but 2028 budget planning inputs are now less stable, and pass-through language in your contract matters more than usual.

Timing: If your renewal falls between now and December 10, waiting for the audit result can cut either way. Short-term bridge contracts (3 to 6 months) let you re-shop after the audit publishes without locking the current risk premium in for two years.

The Audit Window Playbook: Three Questions Before You Sign

1. Does your renewal decision fall before or after December 10, 2026, the ERCOT audit target date?
2. Is your annual load large enough (over 5 MW aggregated across sites) that TDU planning assumptions materially move your delivered cost, or small enough that only the commodity rate matters?
3. Are you comfortable with a short-term bridge contract if the audit result reprices the forward curve either direction?

What You Should Do This Week

1. Pull your current contract's end date and calculate the days between now and December 10, 2026.
2. Re-run your load profile at 5,000, 10,000 and 25,000 kWh per month to see how the current TDU bands price each level.
3. Request quotes for both a 6-month bridge and a 24-month fixed so you can compare the audit-hedge scenario against the lock-in scenario side by side.
4. If you use a broker, ask them in writing how they are pricing the audit-risk premium into 2027 contracts.
5. Compare your current rate against the aggregate TDU medians published in this and prior weekly reports.

Questions to ask your REP or broker:

1. How is the ERCOT data center audit affecting your current 24 and 36 month fixed pricing?
2. What is the earliest re-lock option if I sign a 6-month bridge today?
3. Are your transmission and ancillary pass-throughs capped, or do they float with ERCOT charges?

Also moving

• Retail commercial pricing signals held mostly stable through late August. Multiple market summaries from the last week of August 2026 noted abundant natural gas supply and expanded transmission capacity supporting ERCOT price stability, even as AI-driven demand growth builds long-term uncertainty. That framing is directionally consistent with the modest 1.3 percent TCRI move we recorded across our database this week (Utility Dive).
• ENGIE signed a 48 MW solar PPA with QTS for data center operations in Irving. The agreement is a working example of how Texas data centers are using long-term renewable PPAs to hedge both cost and sustainability exposure. Commercial SMB buyers cannot buy PPAs at their scale, but the pricing signal from these deals feeds the same ERCOT forward curve that retail commercial plans reprice against.
• The PUCT audit process is now a real regulatory dependency for 2027 pricing. Commercial buyers should track the December 10 milestone the same way they track EIA Henry Hub gas prints, because the outcome directly affects 4CP planning and transmission cost allocation for large loads (PUCT).

Pricing Trend Analysis

Our tracked commercial rates trended higher this week, up 1.3 percent on average across the 7,940 plans in our database as of August 31, 2026, with the widest gap sitting between short-term and mid-term contract bands. Short-term products (1 to 6 months) now average 8.05 cents per kWh across all five TDU territories, while mid-term contracts (7 to 18 months) average 6.56 cents per kWh, a 23 percent premium for short-term flexibility. Long-term contracts (19 to 36 months) average 7.03 cents per kWh, still below the short-term band because Texas REPs are willing to trade a small premium over mid-term to lock a customer in through 2028.

TDU / Zone	Product	Rate band (cents/kWh)	Aggregate median	As of
Oncor (Dallas-Fort Worth)	All commercial terms	4.30 to 25.26	6.39	Aug 31, 2026
CenterPoint (Houston)	All commercial terms	4.30 to 23.90	6.59	Aug 31, 2026
AEP North	All commercial terms	4.30 to 25.33	6.59	Aug 31, 2026
AEP Central	All commercial terms	4.30 to 25.74	6.71	Aug 31, 2026
TNMP	All commercial terms	4.30 to 26.12	6.52	Aug 31, 2026

The territorial spread runs from a 6.39-cent median in Oncor to a 6.71-cent median in AEP Central, a 5 percent gap that matters more for higher-usage commercial buyers than for small offices. Aggregate day-ahead settlement prices in ERCOT held below $40 per MWh through most of the week, per state-level data on the EIA Texas electricity profile, which helps explain why retail fixed-rate offers stayed roughly stable outside the audit-risk premium described above.

See the full pricing breakdown in our data download.

REP Spotlight: ENGIE Resources LLC

ENGIE Resources LLC is a French-owned Texas retail electric provider with a large multi-territory footprint, publishing 73 commercial plans in our database across all five ERCOT deregulated TDU territories: Oncor, CenterPoint, AEP North, AEP Central and TNMP.

ENGIE Resources positions above the aggregate market average across our tracking this week, and its contract terms range from 1 to 36 months, giving multi-site commercial buyers both bridge and long-term options in a single provider relationship. The provider is one of the few tracked Texas REPs that lists commercial plans in every ERCOT deregulated TDU zone, which is why it appears often in comparison sets for businesses whose facilities cross territory boundaries. ENGIE has been active in the Texas data-center power market this month as well: the parent group's ENGIE North America unit signed a 48 MW solar power purchase agreement with QTS to supply renewable energy to data-center operations in Irving. For commercial buyers, the read-through is that ENGIE is building supply on the same forward curve their retail contracts price against, which is worth knowing when weighing a long-term lock.

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

Buyer Intelligence

The two questions we heard most from Texas commercial shoppers this week both traced back to the same trigger: how to price a contract decision against a regulatory audit whose outcome nobody knows yet. Below are the direct answers our data supports as of August 31, 2026.

Should Texas businesses lock in a long-term commercial contract before the ERCOT audit completes?

For most Texas commercial accounts under 5 MW, a 12 to 24 month fixed contract still prices below the aggregate short-term band we track, so locking a term now hedges near-term ERCOT volatility even before the December 10 audit result. Mid-term fixed averages 6.56 cents per kWh across our database as of August 31, versus 8.05 cents for short-term averages, so the audit-risk premium in long-term offers has not yet closed the mid-term advantage. Buyers over 5 MW should model both the mid-term lock and a 6-month bridge, because the audit result could reprice 2027 forward curves in either direction.

Which ERCOT TDU territory is currently cheapest for commercial buyers?

Based on this week's aggregate medians across our database, Oncor (Dallas-Fort Worth) shows the lowest overall commercial band at 6.39 cents per kWh, followed by TNMP at 6.52 cents. CenterPoint (Houston) and AEP North tie at 6.59 cents, while AEP Central runs highest at 6.71 cents. The 5 percent spread between Oncor and AEP Central is a real cost difference at 25,000 kWh per month but rarely worth a facility relocation. It matters most when a multi-site business is choosing which sites to prioritize for a renewal cycle. For a deeper cross-cut of how TDU territory and contract term interact, see our TDU vs contract term analysis.

Data Snapshot

• Active commercial plans in database: 7,940 (as of Aug 31, 2026)
• Unique commercial plan identities tracked: 571
• Plans added this week: 193
• Plans with rate changes this week: 5,358
• Plans removed this week: 16
• Average contract term across tracked plans: 24.0 months
• Week-over-week market-average rate change (TCRI): +1.3 percent

This report shows aggregate commercial rate bands. Full provider-level and historical data are available to Texas Commercial Plans subscribers.

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

Frequently Asked Questions

What are current Texas commercial electricity rates as of August 31, 2026?

The TxCP Commercial Rate Index (TCRI) sits at 7.33 cents per kWh as of August 31, 2026, up 1.3 percent from 7.24 cents the prior week. Aggregate bands run from 4.3 cents at the low end to 26.1 cents at the high end across the 7,940 commercial plans we track in ERCOT's five deregulated TDU territories.

How does the ERCOT data center audit affect Texas commercial electricity rates?

Governor Abbott's August 3, 2026 moratorium and the ERCOT audit due December 10, 2026 are already showing up as a wider spread between short-term and mid-term contract bands, roughly 23 percent higher for short-term this week, because Texas REPs are baking the audit-outcome uncertainty into forward-priced fixed contracts. Small commercial buyers under 75 MW are not subject to the moratorium itself, only its downstream effect on ERCOT forward curves.

Which Texas TDU territory has the cheapest commercial electricity this week?

Oncor (Dallas-Fort Worth) leads with an aggregate median of 6.39 cents per kWh as of August 31, 2026. TNMP follows at 6.52 cents, CenterPoint (Houston) and AEP North tie at 6.59 cents, and AEP Central runs highest at 6.71 cents. All five territories share the same low-end band around 4.3 cents on the deepest-discount short-term plans in our database.