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Pacific energy costs: the widest split in American energy

No region contains a wider energy spread than the Pacific. In 2024 Washington households paid 11.90¢ per kWh for electricity while Hawaii paid 42.86¢ — three and a half times as much — and California paid 31.97¢, the second-highest price on the mainland. Yet Pacific homes used the least energy of any U.S. division, 57.4 MMBtu per household in EIA's RECS survey, and spent a joint-lowest $1,653. This page covers the five Pacific states together, because the contrast between the coastal mainland, and Alaska and Hawaii, is the story.

Electricity, use and bills: EIA-861 Table 5A (2024). July column: Electric Power Monthly Table 5.6.A, preliminary. Gas: Natural Gas Annual Table 23 (2024).

Two divisions, deliberately kept apart

EIA itself refuses to average this region into one number: the Electric Power Monthly reports a Pacific Contiguous division (California, Oregon and Washington) and a Pacific Noncontiguous division (Alaska and Hawaii) separately. In July 2026 the contiguous division averaged 27.14¢ per kWh — a figure that itself blends California's 33.61¢ snapshot with Oregon's 15.97¢ and Washington's 14.71¢ — while the noncontiguous division averaged 40.76¢, up 17.2% on July 2025, the largest year-over-year rise of any division. Even the cheaper of the two Pacific divisions was among the most expensive in the country that month, behind only its island counterpart. Anyone quoting a single "West Coast price" is hiding at least a two-to-one spread, and anyone including Hawaii is hiding a three-to-one one.

Low use is the Pacific's saving grace

RECS explains why Pacific bills are not as extreme as Pacific prices. At 57.4 MMBtu per household, the Pacific division uses about a quarter less energy than the U.S. average and barely half what an East North Central household uses, because much of coastal California, Oregon and Washington has mild winters, limited air-conditioning load, or both. California's average home used just 503 kWh a month in 2024 — the pattern behind the familiar result that the country's second-highest electricity price produces only a mid-pack bill of $160.86. Hawaii is the exception that proves the rule: the highest price in the country (42.86¢) paired with the lowest usage (495 kWh) still produced the highest average bill, $212.12, because at island prices there is not enough usage left to cut.

The fuels EIA does not survey here — an honest gap

Two gaps in the official record matter for this region, and this site leaves them as gaps rather than filling them with estimates. First, EIA's weekly Heating Oil and Propane Update does not publish a residential propane average for any of the five Pacific states: Alaska, California, Hawaii, Oregon and Washington are all on its unsurveyed list, because propane heating is uncommon or supplied through channels the survey does not sample. Second, none of the five is in the 21-state heating-oil survey either. A Pacific household heating with propane therefore has no official state average to benchmark a supplier's quote against — the nearest published evidence is the national survey average of $2.689 a gallon in the week of October 19, 2026, which describes surveyed states, not this one. Delivered natural gas, where pipelines reach, is published: it ran from $11.73 per Mcf in Alaska and $12.72 in Washington to $19.14 in California and an exceptional $48.88 in Hawaii, the highest delivered residential gas price in the country. For winter context, EIA's 2026–27 outlook forecasts West-region households to spend $590 heating with gas (up 7%) and $1,151 with electricity (up 9%) from November through March, and it publishes no West propane figure at all.

Sources: EIA — Electric Sales, Revenue & Average Price 2024, Table 5A (Form EIA-861) · EIA — Electric Power Monthly, Table 5.6.A (July 2026) · EIA — Natural Gas Annual 2024, Table 23 (Form EIA-176) · EIA — Heating Oil and Propane Update (week of October 19, 2026) · EIA — Winter Fuels Outlook, October 2026 Short-Term Energy Outlook (published October 6, 2026) · EIA — Residential Energy Consumption Survey (RECS) 2020, Table CE1.1. Last verified: October 2026 — energy prices move with seasons and markets; confirm the current rate on your own bill.

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