Prototype · 2 October 2026 · built from public data listed at the bottom · not reviewed by CCE Tompkins or any agency
Six questions people ask about energy, answered with public numbers for Tompkins County, New York. Most end with what you can do. The idea is meant to work for other places too; Tompkins is first.
Question 1
Mostly because the price per kWh rose, and more than half of that rise matches general inflation. The energy itself, bought on the grid, is usually a fraction of the price and swings from month to month.
Also true: this is a Northeast-wide average, not NYSEG’s own rate. The US average rose over the same months, so the rise isn’t only a Northeast story.
Household: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics average price APU010072610, monthly, delivery and supply included; October 2025 is missing from BLS data. Wholesale: NYISO’s day-ahead price for the Central New York zone (Zone C), which includes Tompkins, hourly values averaged by month; NYISO publishes dollars per MWh, and $10 per MWh is 1¢ per kWh. Today’s dollars use the BLS Consumer Price Index for the Northeast, August 2026; October 2025, which BLS hasn’t published, uses its neighboring months.
Also true: in January 2026 the wholesale price reached about two-thirds of the household price. The two lines also cover different areas (all Northeast states, and the Central New York grid zone), so the gap between them isn’t exactly NYSEG’s delivery charge.
Your NYSEG bill has two parts. Supply is the energy itself; its price tends to move with the amber line. Delivery is the poles and wires; the state Public Service Commission approves its rate. You can choose who supplies your energy. You can’t choose who delivers it.
Example values: $300 in 2019, $475 now. A bill also changes with how much you use, so this shows what changed, not why.
Question 2
Example: 650 kWh. Your bill’s dates rarely match a calendar month, so treat this as approximate.
NYSERDA Utility Energy Registry, county monthly home electricity use ÷ number of home accounts, NYSEG only. August and September 2023 are left out: the state file puts both months’ use in August and reports zero for September.
The average Tompkins home used – kWh in 2025, about 6% more than in 2016 (7,598). That average mixes apartments, large houses and homes heated with electricity, so a home with electric heat can be well above it and still be typical.
Also true: the number of home accounts grew about 12% over the same years, and the county permitted 5,034 new homes from 2016 to 2025, 70% of them in buildings with five or more apartments. The mix of homes changed, so the average can’t separate new homes from changing habits.
Question 3
Energy comes in units nobody pictures. Here everything is measured against one yardstick: the electricity an average Tompkins home used in 2025, – kWh. Pick something. Each is one example, not the whole story of that technology. Prices are Northeast averages for August 2026.
Question 4
Of 100 MW, 71 MW was connected in 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2024, and 96% of that came from solar farms.
NYSERDA Statewide Distributed Solar Projects, Tompkins County.
Small systems on homes and businesses are most of the projects; a few dozen solar farms are most of the power.
Also true: the 20% compares an estimate of what all panels connected through August 2026 make in a year with what NYSEG metered in 2025, so it’s approximate.
Question 5
Energy keeps homes warm, food cold and hospitals running. It also has costs beyond the bill, including the carbon dioxide released when fuel is burned. Both sides can be measured, and so can where the energy goes.
World Bank indicators EG.ELC.ACCS.ZS and SP.DYN.LE00.IN, 2023.
In the 15 places where fewer than half of people have electricity, median life expectancy is 62.2 years. In the 140 where at least 99% do, it’s 77.6.
Also true: places with electricity are also richer, with more doctors, clean water and food, so this doesn’t say how many years electricity adds on its own.
U.S. Energy Information Administration, shares by sector as shown in its U.S. energy facts graphic for 2024, rounded as published (they add to 101%). EIA also publishes other ways of splitting energy by sector, which give different shares.
Data centers, which run email, banking, streaming and AI, used 4.4% of US electricity in 2023. The Department of Energy’s projection for 2028 is 6.7% to 12%, depending on how fast demand grows.
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory for the U.S. Department of Energy, 2024 United States Data Center Energy Usage Report, December 2024.
Also true: 4.4% is of electricity, not of all energy. Electricity is only part of the energy in the chart above, so data centers’ share of all energy is smaller than 4.4%.
EPA’s power-plant database (eGRID 2023), Upstate New York, share of power generated. Power also flows between regions, so this is what was generated here, not exactly what each home received.
So a kWh here carries about a third of the US average carbon: 0.11 kg of CO₂ against 0.35. The gas figure below covers homes with gas service; many rural homes heat with oil or propane instead.
Rates used, in kg of CO₂: electricity 0.11 per kWh (EPA, upstate 2023 average); gas 5.31 per therm; heating oil 10.21 per gallon; propane 5.72 per gallon; gasoline 8.78 per gallon (EPA Emission Factors Hub, January 2025).
Also true: the gas figure is mostly heating and the electricity figure mostly isn’t, so this doesn’t say which way of heating emits more.
Question 6
Not built yet. New York lets you give an organization permission to see your NYSEG usage through a state system (never your password), and take it back any time. With your own usage, this page could show:
Heating, cooling and always-on use separated, by matching your usage to local weather.
What your current heating would cost from a heat pump, at today's prices, with the uncertainty shown.
Your yearly use against what a roof your size here produces, so a quote can be checked.
Usage before and after an upgrade, adjusted for a colder or milder winter.
Where these numbers come from
| Source | What it gives | Covers |
|---|---|---|
| NYSERDA Utility Energy Registry | Monthly electricity and gas use by county, town and ZIP code, with account counts | 2016 – Dec 2025, gaps |
| Bureau of Labor Statistics | Average household price per kWh; gasoline price; Consumer Price Index | 2016 – Aug 2026 |
| NYISO | Hourly wholesale electricity prices by grid zone; list of projects waiting to connect | 2016 – Sep 2026 |
| NYSERDA distributed solar | Every connected solar project, size, town, type | 2001 – Aug 2026 |
| EPA eGRID 2023 | Carbon per kWh and where power came from, upstate New York and US | 2023 |
| EPA Emission Factors Hub | CO₂ per therm or gallon of fuel; energy in a gallon of gasoline | Jan 2025 edition |
| World Bank | Share of people with electricity; life expectancy | 2023 |
| U.S. Energy Information Administration | US energy use by sector | 2024 |
| U.S. Department of Energy | Data centers' share of US electricity (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory report) | 2023, 2028 projection |
| Census Bureau building permits | New homes permitted each year, by size of building | 2016 – 2025 |
| Google and OpenAI | Energy per AI text prompt, published by each company for its own product | 2025 |
Not used yet: NYSEG's own monthly supply prices (its site blocks automated downloads), Census data on how Tompkins homes heat (needs a free access key), and the state's IEDR platform for grid and household data.
Missing from the files: home electricity for all of 2021, July–December 2022 and February–June 2024; August and September 2023 are left out because the file puts both months’ use in August. The price series is missing October 2025.