From KCUR:

Peak electricity rates will nearly quadruple under default Evergy plans in Missouri

KCUR | By Frank Morris

Evergy's Missouri customers will default to rates that spike up dramatically in late afternoon starting in October. While the company says most of its customers will save money, others will pay more. And all customers will have to watch when they use more power.

Variable rate time-of-use pricing will soon be inescapable for Evergy customers in Missouri. In one billing plan, the top rate will be roughly four times as expensive as the base rate, forcing consumers to pay close attention to the way they buy and use electricity.

You know how holiday stuff is expensive when you most want to buy it, but cheaper after the holidays?

The same dynamic will soon apply to what you pay for electricity on the Missouri side of the Kansas City area.

All of Evergy's Missouri customers will see a steep price hike for the electricity they burn during the peak demand hours of late afternoon and early evening.

It's called time-of-use pricing and Jim Busch, the director of industry analysis at the Missouri Public Service Commission, said it makes sense.

"When you look at the overall benefits to the consumers and the company and society as a whole," he said, "it's a better path to go down."

Evergy's change to the time-sensitive model comes with particularly dramatic upticks.

Electricity costs more to generate at peak times, like summer evenings when everyone's running their air conditioners. Companies have to fire up auxiliary generators to meet that demand.

That means burning natural gas. Cranking up those gas plants costs more to kick out the same power than coal, solar, wind and nuclear.