High Point Energy (City of High Point) Rate Selection Guide
The City of High Point operates High Point Energy, a municipal electric utility serving roughly 44,000 customers in North Carolina's Piedmont Triad. The utility is mid-transformation: a Tantalus TUNet AMI rollout (~80,000 electric and water meters) completes by end of 2026 and a new customer portal launched March 4, 2026 — but Green Button, EDI, APIs, and formal third-party data programs remain unavailable, so C&I teams work through portal CSV exports and case-by-case data requests.
Market Overview
High Point Energy is a municipal utility in North Carolina, certified as an APPA Reliable Public Power Provider since 2006 and operating since 1893. Customers take bundled service from the city; North Carolina does not mandate data access programs for municipal utilities.
Need to pull your actual usage data to compare rates? See the High Point Energy (City of High Point) Data Access Guide →
Current Rate Schedules
High Point Energy, the City of High Point's municipal electric utility, publishes its rate schedules through the city's Document Center rather than a state-regulated tariff book — as a municipal utility, rates are set by City Council. The commercial and industrial lineup includes Rate 10 (General Service C&I), Rate 21 (Industrial Service), Rate CP (Commercial Coincident Peak), Rate 33 (C&I Time of Use), and Rate 24 (Building Construction Service), plus Economic Development Credit riders (EDC-1) for qualifying expansions. Published schedules list structure and eligibility; consult the current rate documents for dollar figures, which the city updates with its fiscal-year budget.
Effective: July 1, 2025 · Full Tariff Book →
| Schedule | Type | Applicability | Structure | Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rate 10 – General Service Commercial/Industrial | commercial | General commercial and light industrial accounts in High Point's municipal service territory | Monthly customer charge plus energy charges, with demand billing for larger general-service accounts; see tariff for current rates | — |
| Rate 21 – Industrial Service | industrial | Larger industrial customers, including the furniture, textile, and manufacturing operations characteristic of the Piedmont Triad | Demand-billed service with customer, demand, and energy charges; see tariff for current rates | — |
| Rate CP – Commercial Coincident Peak | commercial | Commercial/industrial accounts able to manage usage during the utility's coincident peak hours | Demand charges keyed to the customer's load at the system coincident peak rather than its own maximum demand — rewards curtailment when High Point's wholesale demand peaks; see tariff for current rates | — |
| Rate 33 – Commercial/Industrial Time of Use | commercial | C&I accounts with load flexibility that can shift consumption to off-peak periods | Time-differentiated energy (and demand) pricing with on-peak and off-peak periods; see tariff for current rates | — |
| Rate 24 – Building Construction Service | commercial | Temporary service for buildings under construction | Temporary-service customer and energy charges during the construction period; see tariff for current rates | — |
Rate Recommendations by Use Case
Manufacturing and furniture industry plants
High Point's legacy furniture and textile manufacturers, plus newer light-industrial operations, typically take service under Rate 21 Industrial Service or Rate CP if they can curtail at system peak.
Rate CP bills demand on the customer's contribution to High Point's coincident system peak. Plants with interruptible processes or shift flexibility can cut demand costs substantially versus standard non-coincident demand billing under Rate 21.
- Use the new AMI portal's interval data to identify when your load coincides with system peaks (typically summer late afternoons)
- Evaluate Rate CP vs Rate 21 annually — the better choice depends on how reliably you can curtail at peak
- Ask about Economic Development Credit riders (EDC-1) before committing to expansions or new load
Showrooms, retail, and offices (High Point Market exhibitors)
Showroom buildings and commercial offices — including the large furniture showroom inventory that peaks around the biannual High Point Market — generally fit Rate 10 General Service.
Buildings with highly seasonal occupancy (Market weeks) or controllable HVAC load may benefit from Rate 33 TOU pricing, shifting pre-conditioning and plug loads off-peak; steady-occupancy sites usually stay on Rate 10.
- Compare a year of billing under Rate 10 against modeled Rate 33 TOU costs before switching
- Pre-cool showrooms ahead of on-peak periods during Market weeks when occupancy spikes
- Verify demand ratchets or minimum charges don't penalize seasonal buildings that sit near-idle between Markets
New construction and expanding facilities
Developers and expanding businesses use Rate 24 during construction, then select a permanent C&I schedule at occupancy — often with EDC-1 economic development credits in play.
Choosing the permanent schedule before energization — and securing EDC-1 credits where new load qualifies — avoids paying a mismatched rate during the first year of operation.
- Engage High Point customer service (336-883-3111) on rate selection before the permanent meter is set
- Model expected demand profile to choose between Rate 10, Rate 21, and Rate CP at occupancy
- Document expected load growth in EDC-1 applications — credits are tied to qualifying new demand
Cost Optimization Strategies
As a municipal utility, High Point Energy buys wholesale power and recovers costs through council-set rates, so the levers for C&I customers are demand management, rate-schedule selection, and timing. The March 2026 AMI rollout (Tantalus) gives customers interval data for the first time — the foundation for every strategy below.
Coincident-peak curtailment under Rate CP
For: Industrial and large commercial accounts with interruptible or schedulable processes
Shift or shed load during High Point's system peak hours so your billed coincident-peak demand drops. Because Rate CP bills demand on your contribution to the system peak rather than your own maximum, even a few well-timed curtailment hours per month move the bill.
TOU load shifting under Rate 33
For: C&I accounts with flexible or automatable loads
Move batch processes, EV charging, water heating, and thermal storage charging into off-peak windows under the C&I Time of Use schedule, and pre-condition buildings before on-peak periods begin.
Annual rate-schedule audit
For: All C&I accounts, especially those near class breakpoints or with changed operations
Re-run the numbers across Rate 10, Rate 21, Rate CP, and Rate 33 each year using 12 months of AMI interval data. Municipal rate updates with the city budget cycle can flip which schedule is cheapest for a given load shape.
Demand-peak smoothing
For: Demand-billed accounts on Rates 10, 21, and CP
Stagger motor starts, HVAC stages, and compressor cycles so the 15/30-minute demand interval that sets your billed kW stays flat. The new AMI data makes the peak-setting interval visible for the first time.
Economic development credits for new load
For: Expanding or relocating commercial and industrial customers
Apply for EDC-1 Economic Development Credit riders when adding qualifying new demand through expansion or relocation — credits offset early-year demand charges while the facility ramps.
To implement these strategies, you need your 15-minute interval data. Learn how to download High Point Energy (City of High Point) interval data →
Frequently Asked Questions
Can C&I customers get interval data from High Point Energy today?▾
Partially. The Tantalus TUNet AMI rollout (~80,000 electric and water meters) completes by end of 2026, and the portal shows smart meter consumption with CSV export. Specific 15- or 30-minute interval data is not natively exposed — request it through customerservice@highpointnc.gov with a formal data request (typically a 5-10 business day turnaround). Rate 33 TOU service confirms the meters are 15-minute capable.
Does High Point support Green Button, EDI, or an API?▾
No confirmed support. The SilverBlaze portal platform is technically Green Button-capable, but High Point has not enabled or announced it. There is no EDI trading partner program, no ESPI implementation, no public API, and no aggregator partnerships. The Cayenta CIS is not exposed to customers.
How does a third-party consultant access a customer's High Point data?▾
Through manual channels: have the customer download CSV/PDF data from the portal, or submit a written data request to customerservice@highpointnc.gov with a signed customer authorization letter, account number, data scope, and business purpose. The utility reviews requests case-by-case with no standardized SLA.
What changed with the new March 2026 portal?▾
The portal launched March 4, 2026 adds real-time usage viewing, smart meter information, bill statement downloads, text alerts for outages and high usage, and predicted billing. It replaces the SilverBlaze v4.0 portal that was active through March 3, 2026.
What rate options matter most for High Point C&I accounts?▾
Rate 10 (General Service C&I), Rate 21 (Industrial), Rate CP (Commercial Coincident Peak), and Rate 33 (C&I Time of Use with 15-minute interval pricing). Economic Development Credit Riders (EDC-1) may apply for qualifying expansions. All schedules are published at highpointnc.gov/447/Electric-Rate-Schedule.
When will formal third-party data programs be available?▾
Unlikely before 2027. The utility's AMI deployment completes late 2026 and an MDMS procurement (RFP 8026-041522) is integrating Tantalus data with the Cayenta CIS and DER programs. Aggregators should engage Customer Service Director Jeremy Coble after AMI goes live to propose data access terms.
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