As ordered reported by the House Committee on Energy and Commerce on July 21, 2026
By Fiscal Year, Millions of Dollars | 2026 | 2026-2031 | 2026-2036 | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Direct Spending (Outlays) | 0 | 0 | 0 | ||||||||
Revenues | 0 | 0 | 0 | ||||||||
Increase or Decrease (-) in the Deficit | 0 | 0 | 0 | ||||||||
Spending Subject to Appropriation (Outlays) | 0 | * | not estimated | ||||||||
Increases net direct spending in any of the four consecutive 10-year periods beginning in 2037? | No | Statutory pay-as-you-go procedures apply? | No | ||||||||
Mandate Effects | |||||||||||
Increases on-budget deficits in any of the four consecutive 10-year periods beginning in 2037? | No | Contains intergovernmental mandate? | Yes, Under Threshold | ||||||||
Contains private-sector mandate? | Yes, Under Threshold | ||||||||||
* = between -$500,000 and $500,000. | |||||||||||
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H.R. 9332 would require the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to establish regional boards to study best practices for forecasting electric load, the amount of electricity used at a particular time. A FERC staff member would chair each board, which also would include a representative from each state public utility commission in the region. The bill would require FERC, within a year of enactment, to report to the Congress on best practices and recommendations from the regional boards on forecasting electric load. The boards would terminate after submitting their report.
CBO expects that implementing H.R. 9332 would have a small effect on FERC’s workload. Because FERC is authorized to collect fees to recover its costs, which are controlled through annual appropriation acts, CBO estimates that net discretionary costs for FERC would be negligible over the 2026-2031 period.
H.R. 9332 would impose intergovernmental and private-sector mandates as defined in the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act (UMRA). CBO estimates that the aggregate costs of those mandates would be below the annual thresholds established in UMRA for intergovernmental and private-sector mandates ($107 million and $214 million in 2026, respectively, adjusted annually for inflation).
The bill would require state regulatory commissions to consider whether to adopt the load forecasting standards recommended by FERC. Although this would impose additional administrative costs, commissions may adopt or reject federal standards for ratemaking under current law. CBO estimates the costs to regulatory commissions would be small.
If FERC increases their fees to offset the costs of implementing the bill, the bill also would increase the cost of an existing mandate on public and private entities, such as electric utilities, that are required to pay those fees. CBO estimates that the additional amounts collected would be small.
The CBO staff contacts for this estimate are Grace Berry (for federal costs) and Brandon Lever (for mandates). The estimate was reviewed by H. Samuel Papenfuss, Deputy Director of Budget Analysis.
Phillip L. Swagel
Director, Congressional Budget Office