Electricity sector of the United States

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Net electricity generation by energy source for 2023^[1]

   Natural gas (42.3%)

   Nuclear (18.2%)

   Coal (15.9%)

   Wind (10.0%)

   Hydro (5.6%)

   Solar (5.6%)

   Biomass (1.1%)

  Other (0.3%)

The United States has the second largest electricity sector in the world, with 4,178 Terawatt-hours of generation in 2023.^[2] In 2023 the industry earned $491b in revenue (1.8% of GDP) at an average price of $0.127/kWh. ^[3]

There are three major synchronous electrical grids in the continental US: the Eastern Interconnection, the Western Interconnection and the Texas Interconnection. Within these physical grids, there are Independent System Operators and Regional transmission organizations, which are not-for-profit organizations that operate an area of the grid and are obliged to provide indiscriminate access to various suppliers (e.g. power plant owners, transmission line providers) to promote competition. Some areas instead have a vertically integrated utility like Southern Company where everything is done by one company.

The U.S. electricity sector is regulated by different public institutions with some functional overlaps. The federal government sets general policies through the Department of Energy. Economic regulation of the distribution segment is a state responsibility, usually carried out through Public Utilities Commissions; the inter-state transmission segment is regulated by the federal government through the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

Electricity generation has been approximately flat in the last ten years,^[4] but with significant changes in composition over that time. In 2013 coal was 38.8% of generation, natural gas was 27.6%, nuclear was 19.4%, wind was 4.1%, hydro was 6.6%, and solar was 0.2%. Because of this shift, CO2 emissions have gone down by 30%.^[5]