The short answer
In Delaware, only Delmarva Power and Delaware Electric Cooperative customers have supplier choice. Municipal utility customers (Newark, Dover, Lewes, etc.) cannot switch suppliers. Visit delpsc.delaware.gov for the supplier directory. 3-business-day cooling-off period applies.
Delaware deregulated retail electricity in 1999 for customers served by Delmarva Power and Delaware Electric Cooperative. The state's nine municipal utilities (Newark, Dover, Lewes, etc.) operate under different rules. The Delaware PSC regulates licensing.
Delaware utility split — IOU vs cooperative vs municipal
Delmarva Power: serves most of New Castle County (Wilmington area) and parts of Kent + Sussex. About 320,000 DE customers. Investor-owned, deregulated supply.
Delaware Electric Cooperative (DEC): serves Kent + Sussex County rural areas. About 105,000 customers. Cooperative-owned, deregulated supply since 1999.
Municipal utilities (Newark, Dover, Lewes, Smyrna, Milford, New Castle, Middletown, Clayton, Seaford): town-owned utilities. Combined ~70,000 customers. Generally no residential supplier choice.
How to switch in Delaware
Step 1: confirm your utility. If Delmarva or DEC, you have supplier choice. If municipal, you do not.
Step 2: visit delpsc.delaware.gov for the DE PSC supplier directory. Step 3: enroll, EDI 814, switch at next meter read.
Step 4: 3-business-day cooling-off.
Delaware in PJM — same wholesale dynamics as MD and NJ
Delaware is fully inside the PJM regional grid. The 2026 PJM capacity auction cleared at decade-high prices ($269.92 to $329.17 per MW-day across most zones), and that increase flows through to Delaware residential bills the same way it does in Maryland and New Jersey — primarily on the delivery side rather than the supply line.
Locked-rate supplier contracts insulate the supply portion of the bill for the contract term (typically 12 to 24 months). Capacity charges still move with PJM clears regardless of supplier choice. The capacity-charge-line-item-explained and capacity-market-pjm-ercot-explained guides cover the underlying mechanics.
Delaware rates sit between Maryland and Pennsylvania on average — slightly higher than Pennsylvania, slightly lower than New Jersey. The structural difference is the fuel mix in PJM zones serving each state and the relative weight of capacity charges in each utility tariff.
Infographic
PJM capacity flow to Delaware residential bills
Delmarva customers vs Delaware Electric Cooperative customers
Delmarva Power serves about 320,000 Delaware customers, primarily in New Castle County (Wilmington area) and parts of Kent and Sussex Counties. Delmarva is investor-owned (subsidiary of Exelon) and operates under Delaware PSC tariffs. The default rate is called Standard Offer Service (SOS) and resets twice yearly.
Delaware Electric Cooperative serves about 105,000 customers in rural Kent and Sussex Counties. DEC is member-owned but participates in the deregulated market — supplier choice has been available to DEC residential customers since 1999. The default rate is called Standard Generation Service.
Both Delmarva and DEC customers can shop the same competitive suppliers licensed by the Delaware PSC. The shopping mechanic is identical for both — confirm which utility serves your address, then visit delpsc.delaware.gov for the licensed supplier directory.
Why municipal utility customers cannot shop suppliers
Delaware has nine municipal electric utilities: Newark, Dover, Lewes, Smyrna, Milford, New Castle, Middletown, Clayton, and Seaford. Combined they serve about 70,000 customers. These utilities are not subject to the 1999 deregulation legislation that opened Delmarva and DEC to supplier choice.
Municipal utilities buy electricity wholesale (typically through DEMEC, the Delaware Municipal Electric Corporation joint-purchase authority) and pass costs through to residents at fixed rates set by the local utility board. Rates can be lower than Delmarva default in some years and higher in others depending on DEMEC procurement strategies.
For residents of municipal utility towns, the cost-reduction levers are different: focus on energy efficiency (the how-to-lower-your-electric-bill guide), demand response if available (some municipals offer it), and rooftop solar with net metering (most Delaware municipals offer net metering similar to Delmarva).
Recap
Bottom line
Delaware has a hybrid retail electricity market: investor-owned Delmarva Power and member-owned Delaware Electric Cooperative customers can shop competitive suppliers, while customers of the nine municipal utilities cannot. For Delmarva and DEC customers in 2026, the cleanest play is locking a 12 to 24-month fixed-rate supplier contract ahead of the next SOS reset to insulate supply costs from PJM capacity-driven volatility.
For municipal customers, the focus shifts to efficiency and rate-class optimization within the local utility tariff. Either way, the how-to-read-your-electricity-bill guide breaks down which charges are which, and the how-to-lower-your-electric-bill guide covers efficiency moves that work regardless of utility structure.
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