---
title: "Utility tariff schedules (NREL / OpenEI URDB)"
method: GET
path: "/api/v2/energy/tariffs"
tags: ["Energy"]
---

# Utility tariff schedules (NREL / OpenEI URDB)

`GET /api/v2/energy/tariffs`

Electricity utility tariff schedules from the NREL / OpenEI U.S. Utility Rate Database (URDB): energy and demand rate structures with their time-of-use period schedules, and fixed and minimum charges, by utility. Select a utility from the periodically ingested URDB snapshot by EIA utility id (eiaid) or by a case-insensitive name substring (utility - an ambiguous substring returns the candidate utilities to choose from); or pass lat and lon (with an optional radius in miles, default 5, max 200) for a location lookup served live from OpenEI. Filter by sector (residential, commercial, industrial, lighting). Community- and utility-submitted schedules, provided as-is under CC BY 4.0; verify against the utility tariff sheet before billing use.

## Query parameters

- `eiaid` integer, nullable — EIA utility id to load from the URDB snapshot.
- `utility` string, nullable — Case-insensitive utility-name substring (URDB snapshot).
- `lat` number, nullable — Latitude for a geo lookup (pair with lon).
- `lon` number, nullable — Longitude for a geo lookup (pair with lat).
- `radius` number — Geo search radius in miles (geo lookup only).
- `sector` 'residential' | 'commercial' | 'industrial' | 'lighting' | 'all'
- `approved` boolean — Restrict to NREL-approved schedules (catalog is approved-only; geo passes it through).
- `limit` integer — Maximum tariffs (or candidate utilities) returned.

## Response `200`

Successful Response

- EnvelopeTariffsFeed
  - `data` TariffsFeed, required
    - `query` TariffsQuery, required
      - `eiaid` integer, nullable — Catalog selector: EIA utility id.
      - `utility` string, nullable — Catalog selector: case-insensitive name substring.
      - `lat` number, nullable — Geo selector latitude (with lon).
      - `lon` number, nullable — Geo selector longitude (with lat).
      - `radius` number, nullable — Geo search radius in miles (geo mode only).
      - `sector` string, required — residential | commercial | industrial | lighting | all.
      - `approved` boolean, required
      - `limit` integer, required
    - `mode` string, required — catalog (blob snapshot) | geo (live OpenEI lookup).
    - `snapshot_date` string, nullable — Ingested URDB snapshot date in catalog mode; null in geo mode.
    - `utility` TariffUtility
      - `eiaid` integer, nullable
      - `name` string, nullable
    - `matches` TariffMatch[], nullable — Candidate utilities when a name substring is ambiguous; null otherwise.
      - `eiaid` integer, nullable
      - `name` string, nullable
      - `sectors` object, nullable — {sector: rate_count} for this utility in the snapshot.
    - `count` integer, required — Number of tariffs returned.
    - `tariffs` Tariff[], required
      - `label` string, nullable — URDB rate identifier.
      - `name` string, nullable
      - `utility` string, nullable
      - `eiaid` integer, nullable — EIA utility id; may be null on live records.
      - `sector` string, nullable — Residential | Commercial | Industrial | Lighting.
      - `description` string, nullable
      - `source` string, nullable — Source reference URL, if provided.
      - `uri` string, nullable
      - `approved` boolean — Whether NREL has approved this schedule.
      - `is_default` boolean — Whether this is the utility's default schedule for the sector.
      - `start_date` string, nullable — Effective date (ISO YYYY-MM-DD); null if unknown.
      - `end_date` string, nullable — Superseded date (ISO YYYY-MM-DD); null if still effective.
      - `fixed_charge` FixedCharge
        - `amount` number, nullable — Charge amount; null if the source omitted it.
        - `unit` string, nullable
      - `min_charge` FixedCharge
        - `amount` number, nullable — Charge amount; null if the source omitted it.
        - `unit` string, nullable
      - `energy` EnergyBlock
        - `tiers_by_period` array[] — Energy rate tiers grouped by time-of-use period (list of periods, each a tier list).
          - TariffTier[]
            - `rate` number — Base rate for this tier (currency per unit).
            - `adj` number, nullable — Per-tier fuel/rider adjustment added to rate; null if none.
            - `effective_rate` number — rate + (adj or 0); the price to bill against.
            - `max` number, nullable — Tier upper bound (kWh for energy, kW for demand); null = unbounded / last tier.
            - `unit` string, nullable
        - `weekday_schedule` array[], nullable — 12x24 matrix of period INDICES into tiers_by_period for weekdays (month x hour); null if flat.
          - integer[]
        - `weekend_schedule` array[], nullable — 12x24 matrix of period indices for weekends/holidays; null if flat.
          - integer[]
      - `demand` DemandBlock
        - `tiers_by_period` array[] — Time-of-use demand rate tiers grouped by period.
          - TariffTier[]
            - `rate` number — Base rate for this tier (currency per unit).
            - `adj` number, nullable — Per-tier fuel/rider adjustment added to rate; null if none.
            - `effective_rate` number — rate + (adj or 0); the price to bill against.
            - `max` number, nullable — Tier upper bound (kWh for energy, kW for demand); null = unbounded / last tier.
            - `unit` string, nullable
        - `weekday_schedule` array[], nullable — 12x24 period-index matrix for weekdays.
          - integer[]
        - `weekend_schedule` array[], nullable — 12x24 period-index matrix for weekends.
          - integer[]
        - `unit` string, nullable
        - `flat_tiers_by_period` array[] — Flat (month-based) demand rate tiers grouped by period.
          - TariffTier[]
            - `rate` number — Base rate for this tier (currency per unit).
            - `adj` number, nullable — Per-tier fuel/rider adjustment added to rate; null if none.
            - `effective_rate` number — rate + (adj or 0); the price to bill against.
            - `max` number, nullable — Tier upper bound (kWh for energy, kW for demand); null = unbounded / last tier.
            - `unit` string, nullable
        - `flat_months` integer[], nullable — 12-length month->period index for the flat demand structure; null if none.
    - `attribution` GridAttributionSet, required
      - `sources` GridSourceAttribution[] — Every sovereign source that contributed to this response.
        - `registry_key` string, required
        - `source_name` string, required
        - `licence` string, required
        - `citation` string, required
        - `disclaimer` string, required
      - `effective_reexport` string, required — Most-restrictive re-export verdict across the sources.
    - `disclaimer` string, required
  - `meta` SugraMeta, required — Metadata on a /api/v1/* response envelope built through `helpers.response.sugra_response`, which is how routes are expected to answer. A route that assembles its own `meta` dict carries only the keys it writes itself, so an optional field below can be absent because this response has nothing to report OR because that route does not build its envelope here - the two are not distinguishable from the outside (API-43).
    - `endpoint` string, required — Requested endpoint path.
    - `data_time` string, required — ISO 8601 timestamp the data on this response is stamped with. It is the source's own timestamp whenever the source supplied one this API could read; when it did not, this field falls back to the value of `response_time` and `data_age_days` is omitted, so the PRESENCE of that field is the signal to read - with the one exception named in its own description, a route that substitutes its own current time for a source timestamp it never received. Usually UTC (`Z`), but a source stating its own numeric offset keeps it (2026-04-16T14:30:00+09:00) rather than being converted a second time. For a source that publishes by period this is the period's START (see `period`) and for one that publishes by calendar day it is that day's midnight - in neither case a moment at which anything was observed or released.
    - `response_time` string, required — ISO 8601 UTC timestamp when this response was produced.
    - `provider` string, required — API name and version.
    - `data_age_days` number, nullable — Age of the data in days at the moment this response was produced, i.e. `response_time` minus `data_time`. Present ONLY when the timestamp this response is stamped with is a clock time that could be read as a real instant. It is ABSENT - never 0 - in every other case. Absent when no readable source timestamp was supplied, because `data_time` then repeats `response_time` and a zero age would assert that the data is current precisely where its true age is unknown. Absent when the source names a calendar day, a month, a quarter or a year (see `period`): the instant is then a boundary this API anchored at midnight, and time since a day or a quarter BEGAN is a different quantity from the age of the data - a daily series is out by up to a day, a quarterly one by up to a quarter. A midnight counts as such a boundary whichever zone it is stated in, and whether the source stated it or this API anchored it. The one case this field cannot see is a route that substitutes its own current time for a source timestamp it never received: the substituted value is a real, readable instant and is indistinguishable from one the source stated, so the age reads as roughly 0. The shared cache-and-fetch helper behind most routes stopped doing that (API-43), but the presence of this field is a statement about the timestamp the response carries, not a guarantee about the route that supplied it. Rounded to 0.001 day (86.4 seconds), so 0.0 is a real measured age anywhere within roughly +/-43 seconds and not a stand-in for unknown; a source stamping an instant in the future reports a negative value (-0.001 or less) rather than being clamped. Sources publish on very different cadences, so a non-zero age is normal, not an error. Preserve absence in client code: a generated client that materialises a missing optional number as its numeric default turns 'age unknown' back into 'age zero', which is the exact confusion this field exists to remove.
    - `source` string, nullable — Identifier of the primary upstream source used for this response.
    - `attribution` string, nullable — Human-readable attribution mandated by an upstream source (e.g. a securities regulator or self-regulatory organization). Present only on responses whose source requires the owner and source to be clearly identified. Do not remove or alter it when using the response.
    - `fallback_used` boolean, nullable — True when the primary source failed and a fallback produced the data.
    - `fallback_chain` string[], nullable — Ordered list of sources attempted, in the order they were tried.
    - `cached` boolean, nullable — True when this response was served from the internal cache.
    - `stale` boolean, nullable — True when the cached response was returned after the upstream rate-limited or errored. Clients can use this to detect degraded data.
    - `period` string, nullable — Unit of observation, when the source publishes by period rather than by instant. `data_time` carries the period's START instant so it stays machine-readable; this field preserves what that instant used to mean, which the conversion would otherwise erase. Present only for such sources, and only when the source hands the API the label itself - a client that converts the period to its start instant before building the envelope loses the label, though not the age exclusion, which is decided by the instant. Note that `data_age_days` is omitted whenever this is present, because an age measured from a period start is not a freshness figure.
    - `notes` string, nullable — Data-quality caveat about THIS response - how old the underlying report is, a chokepoint AIS lower-bound, or that a source-reported `data_time` could not be read and the response time is shown instead. Distinct from `attribution`, which is a licensing obligation. Multiple caveats are joined with ' | '. Present only when there is one.

## Other responses

- `401` — Missing or invalid `x-api-key` header. JSON body with a stable `code` distinguishing `missing_api_key` (no header sent) from `invalid_api_key` (header sent, key not accepted); any other 401 source carries the generic `unauthorized` with its detail as `reason`. Plus `hint`. `plan` is always null on 401 - an unauthenticated request has no plan; quota exhaustion is 429, not 401.
- `422` — Validation Error
- `429` — Daily rate limit exceeded. Check `X-RateLimit-Reset` for the next window.
- `503` — Upstream source is temporarily unavailable. Retry after a short delay.

## Changes

- **2026-09-01** `328d061c12ca` — 3 info
  - added the optional property `meta/data_age_days` to the response with the `200` status
  - added the optional property `meta/notes` to the response with the `200` status
  - added the optional property `meta/period` to the response with the `200` status
- **2026-08-08** `4c4530760ba1` — 12 info
  - added the optional property `code` to the response with the `401` status
  - added the optional property `code` to the response with the `429` status
  - added the optional property `code` to the response with the `503` status
  - added the optional property `hint` to the response with the `401` status
  - …8 more
- **2026-07-26** `7fc920a3005c` — 1 info
  - endpoint added

[Change history](https://skmtc.dev/sugra/apis/sugra-api/changes/api/v2/energy/tariffs/get.md)

---

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