Same House Price, Different Winter Bill: How the Town Line Sets Your Utilities in Buchanan County

Which town in Buchanan County has the cheapest electricity depends on the house. A small home that uses a little power each month ranks the suppliers in one order. An all-electric home in January puts them in a different order. Independence, Jesup, Winthrop, Fairbank and the rural roads between them are each served by a different utility. Each of those utilities splits its bill between a fixed monthly charge and a per-kilowatt-hour charge in its own way, and some of them also change prices by season. Two houses at the same list price can carry very different monthly costs, and the listing sheet won't show it.

The listing sheet leaves out who sends the bill

The utility comes with the address, and the buyer doesn't get to choose. Here's how the main towns line up based on each utility's own community lists and tariffs.

You can check each of these yourself. MidAmerican's gas tariff lists Independence and Jesup as gas communities. Alliant's community list includes Hazleton, Quasqueton and Winthrop for both electric and gas. Fairbank's gas page says the city owns and operates its gas utility. Outside town limits, service depends on the specific address. A community appearing on a utility's list doesn't mean that utility serves every parcel near the edge of town.

How each supplier builds a bill

Every electric bill has two parts. One is a fixed charge you pay even if the house sits empty. The other is a per-kilowatt-hour energy charge. The five suppliers set those two parts very differently.

• ILPT in Independence charges a $31.00 monthly basic service charge plus $0.1070 per kWh. The price is the same all year. This schedule took effect January 1, 2026, after the ILPT Board of Trustees approved it on November 26, 2025, according to ILPT's electric rate tariff.
• MidAmerican in Jesup has an $8.50 base charge. Energy costs $0.10575 per kWh in summer. In winter it costs $0.08044 for the first 1,000 kWh and $0.04536 for every kWh after that, per MidAmerican's Iowa electric tariff.
• Alliant in Winthrop, Hazleton and Quasqueton charges $15.50 a month plus $0.13398 per kWh in summer and $0.09992 in winter, per Alliant's residential rate sheet.
• Fairbank charges $0.130 per kWh for the first 600 kWh. Above 600, the rate is $0.112 as of July 1, 2026. The facility charge is $8.00 a month, or $5.00 for homes the city classifies as all-electric, under Fairbank's city code.
• East-Central Iowa REC charges rural farm and residential members $0.1022 per kWh. The basic facility charge is $44.00 a month at 15 kVA or less and goes up to $67.25 for multi-phase service, per the co-op's revised tariff.

How these structures compare depends on how much power the home uses. A high fixed charge is a big share of a small bill and a small share of a large one. A seasonal schedule rewards homes that use most of their power in winter and costs more for homes with heavy summer cooling. MidAmerican's lower rate past 1,000 kWh in winter mostly benefits homes that heat with electricity.

Three houses, three different answers

The table below applies each supplier's base schedule to three usage levels. Treat these numbers as illustrations, not predictions. Every supplier adds adjustments on top of the base rate. Those include ILPT's monthly purchased power adjustment, Alliant's and MidAmerican's riders, Fairbank's energy cost adjustment, and the co-op's energy cost adjustment and transformer charge. Taxes aren't included either.

The 2,000 kWh Fairbank figure uses the $5.00 all-electric facility charge. The other Fairbank columns use the standard $8.00 charge.

Look across the rows. At 1,000 kWh in summer, Alliant's base cost is higher than ILPT's flat rate. In winter, Alliant's is lower. At 2,000 kWh in winter, MidAmerican's lower rate past 1,000 kWh brings its base cost to roughly half of what ILPT and the co-op would charge. The co-op's $44 facility charge makes it the most expensive base option for a small house. As usage rises, its gap with ILPT and Fairbank narrows, and its gap with MidAmerican widens. The cheapest supplier changes with the size of the house and the season. A buyer comparing an all-electric ranch in Jesup to a similar house in Independence is comparing two different pricing systems, even if the asking prices match.

Independence also has a utility perk most of the county doesn't. ILPT sells municipal fiber internet. Its residential internet page lists 100 Mbps for $59.95 a month, 250 Mbps for $89.95 and 1,000 Mbps for $99.95, with unlimited data and a $29.95 installation fee.

Heating sorts the county a second time

Electric rates are only part of a winter bill. The heating fuel is set by the town line too, and each gas supplier's prices are moving in a different direction this season.

Winthrop, Hazleton and Quasqueton are on Alliant gas, which was just ordered to lower its rates. On August 26, 2026, the Iowa Utilities Commission ordered a permanent cut of more than $2.5 million to Interstate Power and Light's residential natural gas rates, which works out to $0.01886 per therm. The commission found the utility's actual gas costs and revenues fell outside the range approved in its last rate case. It found electric rates within range and left them unchanged. Alliant's current residential gas tariff is dated effective October 6, 2026, and lists a non-gas charge of $0.32313 per therm.

Independence and Jesup are on MidAmerican gas, which is asking for an increase. In its July 7, 2026 filing with the Iowa Utilities Commission, MidAmerican requested $54.9 million a year in added base revenue. In its announcement, the company said a typical residential bill would rise $2.89 a month, from $55.60 to $58.49. It added that the change covers delivery charges, not the cost of the gas itself. The commission has said that interim increases are refundable with interest if final rates come in lower, and MidAmerican's pending tariff list shows a proposed effective date of June 7, 2027, for final rates.

Rural homes without gas usually heat with propane, and it costs more than it did a year ago. The U.S. Energy Information Administration's Heating Oil and Propane Update put Iowa's average residential propane price at $1.746 per gallon, before taxes, for the week of October 26, 2026. That's $0.224 higher than the same week a year earlier. On the co-op electric schedule, those homes also pay the highest fixed charge in the county. A rural buyer is taking on two separate winter costs, and both rose or stayed high this fall.

Rates that are already scheduled to change

Some of these numbers will change no matter who owns the house. Fairbank's ordinance includes a rate table that raises the residential rate above 600 kWh every July. It goes from $0.112 this year to $0.115 in 2027, then $0.118, $0.121 and so on, reaching $0.131 in 2034. The first 600 kWh stays at $0.130 throughout. A Fairbank buyer can see the next eight years of that rate today, which is unusual.

ILPT's bill has a moving part built in. Its purchased power adjustment adds or subtracts an amount each month based on how ILPT's current power costs compare with a base cost of $0.0888 per kWh. If the rolling 12-month average adjustment goes above $0.0150 per kWh, the tariff allows ILPT to consider folding part of it into base rates. The $0.1070 rate is the starting point, and the actual charge per kWh moves above or below it each month.

Questions to settle before you write an offer

1. Which supplier serves this exact address? This matters most for rural parcels and homes near city limits. The co-op's lower "urban residential" rate only applies in platted developments with at least 30 lots and 30 active primary accounts, so most rural houses won't qualify.
2. What fuel does the house heat with? An all-electric house, a gas house and a propane house in the same town can have very different winter bills.
3. Can you see the last 12 months of actual bills? They include the riders, adjustments and taxes the tariff tables leave out. They also show you a full winter and a full summer.
4. For propane homes, who owns the tank and who supplies it? Ask this before closing, since the answer affects your first fill.

This is general information about published utility rates, not financial advice. Confirm the costs for your own situation with the utility and your lender.

A few questions that come up often

Does Independence have the highest electric rates in the county? It depends on usage. ILPT's flat rate costs more than MidAmerican's winter rate at every usage level in the table. At 1,000 kWh in summer, it costs less than Alliant's base rate.

Will Alliant's gas reduction show up on bills this winter? The reduction applies to the residential gas tariff dated effective October 6, 2026, so this heating season's bills in Winthrop, Hazleton and Quasqueton are billed under it.

Is MidAmerican's gas increase final? Not yet. The final rates in MidAmerican's pending tariff list have a proposed effective date of June 7, 2027. Any interim increase is refundable with interest if final rates come in lower.

When we work with buyers comparing towns, getting a year of actual utility bills is one of the first things we ask for, especially before a winter closing. If you'd like help finding out which utilities serve a property and what those bills really look like, reach out to Heather Federspiel and Wapsie Realty. Contact Us.