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ComEd Keeps Power Affordable and Reliable for Customers, While Delivering Clean Energy Advancements in 2025

ComEd Keeps Power Affordable and Reliable for Customers, While Delivering Clean Energy Advancements in 2025

Last year set new initiatives into motion to help customers save, boost renewable access and support communities for a cleaner future

CHICAGO–(BUSINESS WIRE)–
ComEd achieved pivotal advancements in 2025 to meet the energy needs of over 9 million people across northern Illinois. While delivering nation-leading electric utility reliability, ComEd connected tens of thousands of customers to renewable energy resources, awarding more than $500 million in rebates and energy efficiency (EE) savings programs to reduce upfront barriers to EVs, solar and battery storage, heat pumps, and energy efficiency savings technologies to help lower bills. 2025 also saw groundbreaking new financial assistance programs launched, delivering over $100 million in energy relief to customers, and expanded job training for residents of northern Illinois.

ComEd last year marked a major milestone with the launch of its Long‑Range Strategy, a plan to guide investments in reliability and the customer experience over the next decade and beyond, while balancing affordability and the goals set forth in the state of Illinois’ clean energy and economic development priorities. Built to drive outcomes in the three following areas—People, Power and Progress—the plan positions ComEd to deliver long‑term benefits for customers and the communities while balancing affordability for customers in 2026 and beyond.

“In 2025, ComEd achieved significant progress in building a cleaner, more equitable energy future in this region, while maintaining our nation-leading performance on reliability,” said ComEd President and CEO Gil Quiniones. “Unprecedented demand growth will continue to present a challenge for northern Illinois’ electric grid, but the ComEd workforce is dedicated to delivering affordable power that produces real value in the lives of our customers, while ensuring the grid continues to be a foundation for economic development across our region.”

The investments and advancements ComEd made in 2025 provided record benefits for customers and communities in northern Illinois and will continue to positively impact the region long-term:

Providing affordability and reliability for all customers

  • ComEd was ranked No. 1 in providing reliable electric service to customers, compared to similar utilities, in a 2025 benchmark study.
  • ComEd received the 2025 ReliabilityOne award for Outstanding Reliability Performance in the Midwest Metropolitan Service Area and the Technology and Innovation award from PA Consulting.

  • Following investments in smart grid infrastructure, ComEd is delivering record‑setting reliability across the communities it serves, with the fastest restoration performance in ComEd’s history. Of the 16 storms that impacted ComEd customers in 2025, over 99 percent of affected customers were fully restored within 48 hours.

  • Amid ongoing investments in the Smart Grid program, ComEd has improved reliability while maintaining affordability. The latest EEI industry benchmarking reveals that ComEd rates rank among the most competitive in the nation for 2025.

    • The average residential electricity costs in the ComEd territory is 15.34 cents per kilowatt hour (kWh), including supply, remaining at 22 percent below average. ComEd’s Commercial and Industrial rates are respectively 25 percent and 41 percent below the average commercial and industrial rates of the top 20 largest metropolitan areas in the U.S. ComEd’s average bills continue to fall below the ICC’s approved energy‑burden threshold of 3 percent of monthly household income, and the newly proposed grid plan preserves that affordability level.

  • To reduce the burden for those facing economic hardship, ComEd connected more than 220,000 customers to over $108 million in financial assistance and other support options. This included the one-time Customer Relief Fund, a $10 million grant program developed with the support of ComEd’s parent company, Exelon, that provided bill relief to more than 30,000 customers.

  • Over $803 million will be returned to customers as part of Illinois’ Climate and Equitable Jobs Act’s (CEJA) Carbon Mitigation Credit (CMC) program. ComEd residential and commercial customers will benefit from these funds in the form of bill credits over the first five months of 2026.

  • ComEd announced its new Low-Income Discount (LID) Program, in which qualifying residential customers can get monthly discounts based on income level. The program works with the existing state of Illinois Low Income Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) to help reduce the financial burden of rising energy supply costs – which ComEd does not set or control.

  • The first transmission security agreements (TSAs) will help ensure large commercial and industrial projects pay their fair share of connecting to and using the grid. These contracts with large-load customers, including but not limited to data centers, ensure that those customers will pay their full FERC-approved charges for transmission services, and back that promise up with strong credit security, so that other customers are shielded from covering the cost if the projects do not materialize in full or at all. The first tranche of these contracts, signed in December 2025, provides over $2 billion of protection to cover any potential transmission revenue shortfall.

Investments in grid infrastructure

  • In 2025, ComEd invested in infrastructure and grid enhancements across northern Illinois to ensure customer power needs are met today, and the grid is prepared for expected electrical demand growth and evolving environmental factors for years to come.

    • Replaced over 4,700 and reinforced over 8,400 of ComEd’s 1.3 million utility poles to ensure grid resiliency throughout the region.

    • Replaced over 269 miles of overhead and underground distribution cable.

  • ComEd announced transmission upgrade projects as part of a $1 billion, multi-year, capital investment to support economic growth, increase transmission capacity and bring enhanced reliability to serve the growing northwest suburban business corridor and greater Western O’Hare region of Illinois. These projects included:

  • ComEd’s new Testing and Commissioning Engineering (TCE) training lab, formally opened in December 2025, is a state-of-the-art training hub designed to provide hands-on instruction for employees working in substations, ensuring workforce readiness and safety as ComEd expands its substation network to meet the region’s evolving energy needs.

  • ComEd’s grid modernization plan, approved by the Illinois Commerce Commission in 2024, has supported the creation of hundreds of new jobs in 2025, advancing critical work to meet the evolving needs of the grid and the communities it serves.

  • ComEd filed a new multiyear grid plan in January 2026 to uphold its top reliability, ensuring the grid is equipped to meet evolving demands from weather, electrification, and other sources of load growth, while keeping affordability top of mind. This plan, now before the ICC, outlines investments necessary for meeting evolving demands placed on the grid, maintaining reliability, and achieving state landmark goals set forth in CEJA and CRGA.

Expanding access to renewables and energy efficient options

Energy Efficiency Program

  • ComEd’s award-winning Energy Efficiency (EE) Program, one of the largest in the nation, reached a new milestone surpassing the $12 billion mark in total customer bill savings through reduced energy consumption and efficiency upgrades. ComEd provided more than $300 million in EE rebates and incentives – from heat pumps to other clean energy technologies – in 2025 alone.

  • More than 4,000 heat pump installations were funded through ComEd discounts last year; and more than 400 homes were electrified through ComEd’s Whole Home Electric offering, designed to help low-income customers lower their net energy usage and costs with all-electric upgrades to heating and cooling systems and appliances.

  • The EE Program completed its 100,000th free energy assessment for small businesses and public utilities. These assessments helped business customers save $258 million in annual energy costs and more than 2 billion kilowatt-hours of energy. The program also provided over $300 million in financial incentives, making energy-saving upgrades accessible and more affordable for thousands of business customers across northern Illinois.

  • ComEd supported the development of its 100th project under the Affordable Housing New Construction offering, helping income-eligible residents save nearly 31 million kilowatt-hours of electricity.

Distributed Energy Resources and Solar Energy

  • ComEd interconnected more than 1.4 GW (up from 1 GW in 2024) of distributed energy resources (DER) through more than 2,000 commercial and more than 75,000 residential rooftop solar systems to the grid.

  • More than $80 million in solar and distributed generation (DG) rebates were awarded to customers in 2025 to offset the upfront costs of adding a renewable generating system.

  • ComEd has interconnected the highest level of DERs among midwestern states, largely due to its new DER management system (DERMS), which optimizes grid performance, maintains system reliability and supports renewable integration.

  • To date, 240 community solar projects are interconnected to the grid, with more than 65 coming online in 2025. These deployments enable ComEd customers to benefit solar generation located throughout the service territory.

Beneficial Electrification and Electric Vehicles

  • ComEd was recognized by Public Utilities Fortnightly as a Top Innovator for 2025 for its Electric Vehicle (EV) programs and was the recipient of Chartwell’s 2025 Gold Award for Excellence in EVs for its Beneficial Electrification (BE) Plan. ComEd’s EV investments have helped bring online 10,000 EV chargers since the program’s inception, with over 3,000 fleet EVs added and one new charging port added every two hours in 2025 alone.

  • ComEd has distributed more than $150 million in EV rebates to date, which help reduce financial barriers for residential, business and municipal EV projects. 80 percent of funds were distributed to low-income customers and those located in, or primarily serving, equity investment eligible communities (EIEC).

  • ComEd launched the EV Ambassador program, designed to increase accessibility to BE Plan rebates for small businesses with the help of local partners.

  • ComEd’s Second Beneficial Electrification Plan was approved by the ICC, ensuring funding to support customers with their EV transition from 2026-2028. Additional EV funding information is available in 2026 at ComEd.com/Clean.

  • ComEd graduated the third cohort of the EV Readiness Program, a collaboration with the Metropolitan Mayors Caucus in which local governments receive training and assistance to develop permitting, safety plans and local policies that support safe, accessible EV growth. The fourth cohort will complete the program in 2026.

  • ComEd closed the year with one-third of its fleet comprised of EVs, plug-in hybrid EVs and other electrified equipment and over 1,000 EV charging ports installed across ComEd facilities.

Investing in talent and communities

  • To improve representation in STEM careers, ComEd provided educational opportunities to over 350 students in 2025. These programs included ComEd’s EV Rally, Construct Youth Academy, Black History Month, Hispanic Heritage Month and Women’s History Month STEM labs, and the ASME DropMEin! Program.

  • The ComEd Scholars program provided $300,000 in scholarships to 72 students pursuing STEM degrees at either Illinois Institute of Technology, University of Illinois at Chicago, DePaul University or Chicago State University.

  • ComEd held a record-high nine Powering Lives Resource Fairs, helping connect over 2,600 families to more than 1,700 separate support services, including bill-assistance options and workforce development opportunities.

  • ComEd provided over $605,000 in grant funding to 87 organizations and municipalities through its Green Region, Powering Safe Communities, Powering the Arts and Powering the Holidays competitive grant programs.

  • ComEd employees volunteered more than 34,000 hours of their time and contributed over $1.5 million to over 600 charitable organizations, including over $360,000 for Special Olympics Illinois through the Polar Plunge Chicago and $116,000 for the American Cancer Society.

Advancing clean energy careers and economic development in Illinois

  • ComEd brought nine new major commercial projects to northern Illinois last year, with additional planned projects set to add nearly 2,220 jobs and more than $13 billion in local investment.

  • In recognition of ComEd’s commitment to community-driven workforce programming and bringing strong outcomes for local job seekers, the Center for Energy Workforce Development (CEWD) honored ComEd with the 2025 Community Partner Award.

  • In 2025, ComEd’s CONSTRUCT Infrastructure Academy and Craft Academy, free programs preparing local job seekers for rewarding careers in the construction and utility fields, marked more than 1,000 served since 2013.

  • ComEd helped expand clean energy and weatherization job training through eight ComEd Market Development Initiative (MDI) cohorts, including two joint-utility cohorts with Nicor Gas. These training cohorts helped over 100 local job seekers and entrepreneurs become certified to work in the energy-efficiency industry. MDI’s Energy Efficiency Service Provider program offered nearly 180 services to small trade related businesses to help them grow their businesses, increasing their ability to provide energy-efficiency services to their customers.

  • In 2025, ComEd was named a “Top Utility in Economic Development,” by Site Magazine, which recognized ComEd for its nation-leading grid and daily economic development work that positions the region for economic growth.

  • ComEd is working with stakeholders to achieve the goals outlined in the recently passed Clean and Reliable Grid Affordability (CRGA) Act, which aims to expand generation and clean energy technology solutions, helping customers save while addressing forecast energy supply challenges. This legislation builds on the state of Illinois’ landmark 2021 climate legislation, Climate and Equitable Jobs Act (CEJA).

ComEd is a unit of Chicago-based Exelon Corporation (NASDAQ: EXC), a Fortune 200 energy company serving more than 10.7 million customers electricity and natural gas customers – the largest number of customers in the U.S. ComEd powers the lives of more than 4 million customers across northern Illinois, or 70 percent of the state’s population. For more information visit ComEd.com, and connect with the company on Facebook, Instagram,LinkedIn, X, and YouTube.

ComEd Media Relations

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KEYWORDS: Illinois United States North America

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