Missourians are beginning to see something our parents and grandparents once worried about but rarely experienced —a grid under strain. For fifty years, Missouri enjoyed some of the most reliable, affordable electricity in the nation because past leaders built power plants and transmission lines with the state’s long-term needs in mind. But those mid-twentieth-century baseload power plants are nearing the end of their useful life.
Enter Senate Bill 4 (SB 4), which I enthusiastically supported, and which will ensure the next 50 years of Missouri’s energy future are as reliable and affordable as the last. SB 4 focuses on strategic planning, rebuilding wisely, and facing the real causes of rising energy costs.
The facts below answer what’s really driving up utility bills.
Recent rate increases did not come from SB 4. The law didn’t even take effect until August 2025, long after utilities filed their 2024–25 requests. The facts are clear:
- Missouri retired more than 4,000 megawatts (MW) of dependable coal generation in the last decade.
• Federal regulations made it nearly impossible to upgrade those plants, forcing early shutdowns.
• The costs of fuel, steel, copper, aluminum, transformers, and construction materials have surged, creating financial barriers to new plant construction.
• Missouri’s energy demand has exceeded its production capacity, forcing the state to import energy—paying neighboring states premium prices just to keep our lights on and appliances running.
In 2012, Missouri generated 717 gigawatt-hours (Gh) more electricity than we used. Today, we consume 869 Gh more than we produce. That critical imbalance explains more about today’s bills than any political expedient talking point.
When a state depends on imported electricity, it’s unable to control of its costs. SB 4 puts control back in Missouri’s hands… where it belongs.
Our grid is aging—and that’s a major cost driver
Missouri’s transmission network was built at the same time as our legacy power plants. Poles, lines, and substations installed in the mid-20th century are now failing simultaneously. This adds enormous cost pressure for utilities of all types—investor-owned, co-ops, and municipals.
Coupled with a national transformer shortage, these components—critical to everything from substations to rural feeders—now take two years or more to procure, and their price has tripled since 2015. Copper and aluminum, essential for every mile of line, have also surged.
It is precisely these realities—not SB 4—which explain much of the pressure on Missouri’s electric rates.
Demand is rising faster than supply.
Missouri is attracting new job-creating industries: semiconductor manufacturing, agricultural processing, EV facilities, and massive data centers. The average large industrial project needed 3 MW of power in 2019. By 2023, it needed 162 MW—a staggering 5,300% increase in demand in just four years.
These new industries can help Missouri thrive… but only if we plan wisely.
Fortunately, unlike deregulated markets in eastern states—where data centers can outbid consumers for scarce generation—Missouri is a regulated state. That means large loads must be integrated into long-range plans, not allowed to distort prices or destabilize the grid. SB 4 strengthens that protection.
Separating myth from fact:
Myth: SB 4 caused recent rate increases.
Fact: SB 4 wasn’t even in effect when those increases were filed.
Myth: SB 4 gives utilities a blank check.
Fact: Construction Work in Progress (CWIP) under SB 4 is tightly restricted. CWIP is available only with Public Service Commission (PSC) approval, only for projects included in a utility’s approved four-year Integrated Resource Plan (IRP), and only after Missouri updates its IRP rules in 2027. SB 4 also includes one of the strongest consumer-protection frameworks in the country: the PSC can claw back 100% of CWIP charges if a project is delayed, cancelled, or experiences major cost overruns, and the law sunsets in 2035, requiring the General Assembly to reevaluate whether the program is working as intended.
Myth: Missouri will face the same data-center price spikes seen in Virginia or Maryland.
Fact: Those spikes occurred in deregulated wholesale markets. Missouri’s regulated system prevents data centers from bidding directly against Missouri families for power.
Myth: SB 4 raises long-term costs.
Fact: SB 4 lowers them by reducing financing expenses, increasing oversight, strengthening consumer protections, and enabling in-state plants that replace expensive electricity imports.
SB 4 reforms the parts of Missouri law that prevented us from building modern, efficient baseload power for nearly fifty years. To wit, SB 4:
- Lowers financing costs for new generation by eliminating decades of unnecessary interest charges.
• Modernizes Missouri’s IRP so we can evaluate and approve generation and grid needs transparently.
• Extends grid modernization tools to rebuild our aging transmission and distribution network.
• Establishes a State Reliability Metric to ensure Missouri never again drifts into a capacity shortfall.
• Strengthens consumer protections, including lowering the rate cap on annual increases, expanding oversight staff, and ensuring federal tax savings go directly to customers.
These reforms work together. They bend the cost curve down, restore long-term reliability, and ensure Missouri never finds itself dependent on imported electricity again.
The generation that preceded us responded to increased energy needs by building a system that powered Missouri for half a century. We now face the same challenge—and the stakes could not be higher. If we fail to build new generation and modernize our grid, we will face rolling brownouts, job losses, and escalating utility prices.
SB 4 positions Missouri to meet this moment—not with slogans or short-term thinking, but with durable policy that will serve our children and grandchildren.
For Missourians who want to see the detailed facts, charts, and analysis behind SB 4, a full white paper is available for download by going here https://curtisdtrent.com/issues/
The future belongs to the states that can deliver reliable, affordable electricity. With SB 4, Missouri has chosen to be one of them.
