E-1 -Residential Service Baseline Region Z (All Electric Service)
Applies to Baseline Region Z only — check which one your bill lists.
When does peak hit on Pacific Gas & Electric Co.’s E-1 -Residential Service Baseline Region Z? The hour never matters here — only the season. Rates peak October–May.
- off-peak32.56¢
Weekends are off-peak all day — the cheapest time to run anything you can schedule.
What does E-1 -Residential Service Baseline Region Z cost a year?
| Household | Uses | Per year | Works out to |
|---|---|---|---|
| Apartment One or two people, no central air, no electric heat | 4,866 kWh | $1,940 | 39.9¢ / kWh |
| Family home Three or four people with central air conditioning | 9,453 kWh | $3,760 | 39.8¢ / kWh |
| Home with an EV Same house, plus an electric car charging overnight | 13,103 kWh | $5,246 | 40.0¢ / kWh |
Estimates, not quotes. We run three made-up but realistic households through this tariff hour by hour for a full year — including the way air conditioning loads the afternoon and an EV loads the small hours. Your own bill depends on when you actually use electricity, which is exactly the thing a per-kWh number hides.
What you actually pay
| Period | Rate | Applies when |
|---|---|---|
| off-peak | 32.56¢ up to 6.7 kWh daily40.70¢ up to 26.8 kWh daily40.70¢ | midnight–midnight, June–September |
| off-peak | 32.56¢ up to 15.7 kWh daily40.70¢ up to 62.8 kWh daily40.70¢ | midnight–midnight, October–May |
Plus a fixed charge of $0.79343 per day — so longer months cost more before you use a single kWh.
Should you be on E-1 -Residential Service Baseline Region Z?
The hour of day does not change what you pay here — the month does. Running the same house through the full year, July costs about $455 and February about $230. That $225 swing is part rate and part weather, and it is the reason a budget built on your spring bill will break in July.
There is a usage cliff to watch. The first 6.7 kWh you use each day are billed at 32.6¢; past that line the rate steps up to 40.7¢ — 25% more for every unit after. The last kilowatt-hour of a heavy month is the expensive one, which is why cutting a little off a big month saves more than cutting the same amount off a small one.
Before a single kilowatt-hour moves, this plan charges $290 a year in fixed fees. On the apartment above that is 15% of the whole bill; on the house with a car charging in it, 6%. Fixed charges are invisible in a cents-per-kWh comparison and they punish small users hardest — if you use very little electricity, the headline rate is the least important number on this page.
How it compares to Pacific Gas & Electric’s other plans
Everything below stays inside Baseline Region Z. Your zone is set by where you live, not by anything you can pick, so a cheaper plan in a different zone is not an option you have.
Measured against the other residential plans this utility files, a family home lands 7th cheapest of 8. The cheapest option, Electric Vehicle EV2 (Sch), would run about $303 a year less.
Against E-1 -Residential Service Baseline Region Z, which looks like the plan you land on by default, this one comes out $164 less per year (4%). We infer the default from the tariff structure rather than a flag in the data, so confirm it against your own bill before you switch.
If this is new to you
- What is a baseline allowance? Tiered electricity rates explained
A cheap allowance, then a cliff. Where the cliff sits is the whole game.
- Should you switch to a time-of-use electricity plan?
A wide peak-to-off-peak gap is a lever, not a saving. Levers need something to move.
- Why is my electric bill so high in summer?
Usually three causes at once, and only one of them is your air conditioner.
- How to compare electricity plans without getting it wrong
Six things that break a comparison, and the order to check them in.
Where this comes from
- Effective
- 2026-03-27
the date this tariff took effect
- Covers
- delivery + supply
Generation + Distribution + Transmission + Transmission Rate Adjustments + Reliability Services + Public Purpose Programs + Nuclear Decommissioning + Competition Transition Charges + Energy Cost Recovery Amount + Wildfire Fund Charge + New System Generation Charge + Wildfire Hardening Charge + Recovery Bond Charge + Recovery Bond Credit + Bundled Power Charge Indifference Adjustment
- Enrollment
- open to new customers
Tariff document: https://www.pge.com/tariffs/assets/pdf/tariffbook/ELEC_SCHEDS_E-1.pdf