Pete Ricketts on Energy and Utility Bills: His Deciding Vote to Repeal Clean-Energy Credits, the Data Centers He Recruited as Governor, and the Officials Who Cut Heating Aid Staff and Nebraska's Solar Grant

Nebraska Senator Pete Ricketts voted on July 1, 2025 for the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (roll call 372), which passed 50-50 with the Vice President's tie-breaking vote and ended the federal tax credits for home solar, home efficiency upgrades and electric vehicles, and for wind and solar facilities placed in service after December 31, 2027. That night he voted against amendments to keep those credits and against a motion to prevent changes in policy that will lead to increased electricity prices for American families. Energy Innovation projects that the law and other federal energy policy changes will cost Nebraska households an average of $790 per household in 2035.

Ricketts also voted to confirm Energy Secretary Chris Wright, whose emergency orders keep retiring coal plants running at ratepayers' expense, and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., whose department fired the entire LIHEAP program staff that runs federal heating aid. As Nebraska governor, Ricketts signed the ImagiNE Nebraska Act in 2020 and recruited data centers; by 2024 data centers used 21% of the electricity the Omaha Public Power District sold.

Pete Ricketts's Votes, Actions and Statements on Energy Prices and Utility Bills

• Ricketts Cast a Deciding Vote for the Law That Repealed Clean-Energy Tax Credits in July 2025. On July 1, 2025, Pete Ricketts voted yes on H.R. 1, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which passed 50-50 with the Vice President's tie-breaking vote, so it would have failed without his vote. The law ended the rooftop solar and home battery credit with respect to any expenditures made after December 31, 2025 and cuts off wind and solar projects placed in service after December 31, 2027. Rhodium Group projects household electricity rates increasing by 2-4% in 2035 and says the law puts more than half a trillion dollars of clean energy and transportation investment at risk.
• Ricketts Voted Against Keeping the Wind and Solar Credits in July 2025. On July 1, 2025, Ricketts voted no on Senator Jacky Rosen's amendment to maintain parity for wind and solar facilities under the Internal Revenue Code, which would have removed the bill's new cutoffs for wind and solar. It failed 47-53. Energy Innovation projected that the final law would leave the country with a 340 gigawatt decrease in generation capacity by 2035 and electricity rates 10 to 18 percent higher; for Nebraska it projects 6.9 GW less capacity added in Nebraska through 2040, most of it wind and solar.
• Ricketts Voted Against Keeping the Home Efficiency and Rooftop Solar Credits in July 2025. On July 1, 2025, Ricketts voted no on Senator Jeanne Shaheen's amendment providing that the amendments made by sections 70505, 70506, 70507, and 70508 are repealed, which would have kept the credits for heat pumps and insulation, rooftop solar, efficient commercial buildings and new efficient homes; it failed 49-51. The same night he voted against Senator John Hickenlooper's amendment to keep the rooftop solar credit through 2026 (roll call 365), which failed 48-52. The home efficiency credit and the rooftop solar credit both ended after December 31, 2025, so Nebraska families installing solar panels, heat pumps or insulation in 2026 get no federal credit.
• Ricketts Voted Against Protecting Families From Higher Electricity Prices and Clean Energy Factory Jobs in July 2025. On July 1, 2025, Ricketts voted no on Senator Ron Wyden's motion to return the bill to committee with changes that would prevent changes in policy that will lead to increased electricity prices for American families and small businesses; it failed 47-53. He also voted no on Senator Raphael Warnock's motion for changes that would protect clean energy manufacturing jobs in the United States (roll call 359), which failed 48-51. A year later the business group E2 counted $68 billion in lost capital investment from canceled clean energy factories and power projects, which it attributes to the law and to other administration actions.
• Ricketts Voted Against Overturning the Treasury Rule That Narrowed Wind and Solar Credits in March 2026. On March 25, 2026, Ricketts voted no on taking up S.J.Res. 107, which would have overturned the IRS's "Beginning of Construction" rule for the wind and solar credit termination; the motion failed 47-53. That rule, IRS Notice 2025-42, made a physical-work test "the sole method" for most projects to show they started construction in time, after a July 2025 executive order told Treasury to "strictly enforce the termination", so fewer projects can still claim the credit.
• Ricketts Voted Twice Against Budget Rules to Protect Home Electricity Bills. On February 20, 2025, Ricketts voted no on a motion that would have created a point of order against legislation that would raise energy costs for Americans, including higher monthly electricity bills, as the Senate wrote the budget plan that set up the 2025 law. On April 23, 2026 he voted no on a point of order against legislation that would not decrease home electricity bills, which failed 48-50. Nebraska's average residential electricity price was 13.54 cents per kilowatt-hour in August 2026, up from 12.80 cents a year earlier, according to the Energy Information Administration.
• Ricketts Voted to Repeal Energy-Saving Appliance Standards in 2025. In April and May 2025, Ricketts voted to repeal federal efficiency standards for walk-in coolers and freezers (April 3), gas-fired instantaneous water heaters in homes (April 10) and commercial refrigerators and freezers (May 1), all under the Congressional Review Act. Policy Integrity counts the three as "Fully Repealed" and estimates the lost consumer savings at $283 million, $191 million and $208 million a year, savings that would have reached customers through lower energy bills.
• Ricketts Voted Twice to Keep the Energy Emergency Behind the Coal-Plant Orders. On February 26, 2025 and October 8, 2025, Ricketts voted against resolutions terminating the national emergency declared with respect to energy (second vote), and both failed, 47-52 and 47-51. The emergency framing underpins the Energy Department's orders to keep retiring coal plants open, which Grid Strategies estimates could cost ratepayers $3.121 billion to $5.925 billion a year if extended to every large plant scheduled to retire through 2028.
• Ricketts Voted Against a Budget Measure to Shield Consumers From Iran-War Price Increases in April 2026. On April 22, 2026, Ricketts voted no on a budget motion relating to ensuring that consumers are protected from price increases associated with tariffs and the Iran war, which failed 47-51. He had cast one of the 50 votes in January 2025 to confirm Pete Hegseth, who led the war that began February 28, 2026. Moody's Analytics economist Mark Zandi estimates the war costs the average household nearly $2,000, including $1,100 in higher energy prices, and Nebraska's average gas price rose from $2.59 to $4.04 a gallon, 56.1%, between February 18 and August 20, 2026, according to AAA data.
• Ricketts Voted to Confirm the Energy Secretary Who Ordered a Retiring Coal Plant to Keep Running. On February 3, 2025, Ricketts voted to confirm Chris Wright as secretary of energy. Starting in May 2025, Wright's department issued emergency orders forcing the Campbell coal plant in Michigan to run past its retirement, the sixth of them until November 14, 2026; Consumers Energy has reported $295 million in costs associated with the Campbell plant, and on September 11, 2026 a federal appeals court ruled that the first two Campbell orders were illegal. Across all of the department's emergency orders, ratepayers faced at least $300 million in extra costs through mid-May 2026, according to IEEFA.
• Ricketts Voted to Confirm the Health Secretary Whose Department Fired the Staff Who Run Heating Aid. On February 13, 2025, Ricketts voted to confirm Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as secretary of health and human services. On April 1, 2025, his department fired the entire LIHEAP program staff at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the federal workers who run the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, which USA Today described as helping 6M Americans keep utilities on. Congress kept the program funded, but federal LIHEAP staff have not been rehired, according to the national association of state energy-aid directors.
• As Nebraska Governor, Ricketts Signed the ImagiNE Act and Recruited Data Centers That Now Strain the Omaha Power Supply. As Nebraska governor, Ricketts announced in 2017 that Facebook selected Papillion as the site of its newest data center, and on August 17, 2020 he signed into law Legislative Bill 1107, the ImagiNE Nebraska Act, whose incentives data centers then used. In the Omaha Public Power District's territory, which includes Papillion, data centers went from using 1% of the electricity sold by the utility in 2018 to 21% in 2024, Nebraska Public Media reported, and OPPD now has less than 100 megawatts of available power capacity for new or expanding large customers, so other new or expanding businesses that need two megawatts or more could be at risk, the Flatwater Free Press reported in October 2026 in a story published by Nebraska Public Media. Governor Jim Pillen said data centers' share of Nebraska's electricity has prevented other businesses from expanding in Nebraska when they otherwise would have.
• Ricketts Voted to Confirm the EPA Administrator Who Canceled Nebraska's $62.4 Million Solar Program for Lower-Income Families. On January 29, 2025, Ricketts voted to confirm Lee Zeldin as EPA administrator. In August 2025 his agency terminated the $7 billion Solar for All program, meant to bring solar power to more than 900,000 lower-income Americans; on August 7, 2025 the Center for Rural Affairs received formal notice of termination of Nebraska's $62.4 million grant. A federal judge vacated the termination on September 18, 2026, after a year in which the program was halted, and EPA said it was considering an appeal.
• Ricketts Said Nebraska Is Committed to Low Energy Costs; the Law He Voted For Is Projected to Raise Them. On October 2, 2026, Ricketts wrote, "In Nebraska, we’re committed to maintaining our low cost of energy." Energy Innovation projects, CNBC reported, that the law he voted for will add $250 a year to the average Nebraska household's energy costs by 2035 from the law's energy provisions alone, and the Omaha Public Power District, after holding rates steady for five years, will have seen around a 20% retail rate increase since 2021, Nebraska Public Media reported.
• Ricketts Did Not Join the Senators Who Asked HHS to Restore the Heating-Aid Staff. On April 3, 2025, thirteen senators, including Republicans Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski, wrote to Kennedy urging him to reverse course on the recent reported elimination of the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) workforce; Ricketts was not among the signers listed in the release. Those staff were never brought back: federal LIHEAP staff have not been rehired, according to the national association of state energy-aid directors.

What the Energy Policies Pete Ricketts Backed Cost Nebraska Households

• Household energy costs. Energy Innovation projects that the law and other federal energy policy changes since January 2025 mean Nebraska households will pay an additional $6.8 billion for energy, an average of $790 per household in 2035, and will cost the state's economy 2,400 jobs per year on average over the next decade.
• Power for growth. The Omaha area's utility projects less than 100 megawatts of spare capacity for big new customers, and the Greater Omaha Chamber's board chair said the region is missing out on … potentially, if you put them all together, thousands of jobs if it cannot solve the shortage within five years.
• Solar for lower-income families (halted, then restored by court). The Center for Rural Affairs' $62.4 million Solar for All grant for Nebraska was terminated in August 2025; a court vacated the termination in September 2026.
• Gas prices. Nebraska's average gas price rose 56.1% from February 18 to August 20, 2026, to $4.04 a gallon, after the war began.

Frequently Asked Questions About Pete Ricketts on Energy and utility bills

Last updated: 2026-10-25

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