Commercial Energy in Waukegan, IL: Electricity & Gas

Waukegan is a Lake County industrial and port city with a manufacturing base alongside commercial and institutional accounts. It also carries an important distinction for energy procurement: its natural gas utility is North Shore Gas, not Nicor. That one fact changes which service area, supplier-choice program, and delivery components apply to the gas account, so it's worth nailing down before anything else.

Utilities in Waukegan

• Electricity: ComEd is the delivery utility, with commercial supplier choice available. See the ComEd commercial guide.
• Natural gas: North Shore Gas is the delivery utility — not Nicor — with commercial supplier choice through its Choices for You program. See the North Shore Gas commercial guide.

North Shore Gas serves a set of Lake County and far-north communities, and Waukegan is one of them. Because most northern-suburb businesses are on Nicor, this is a frequent point of confusion — always confirm the gas utility from a recent bill.

Supply versus delivery, and how choice works here

A Waukegan facility's bills separate into delivery and supply, just as anywhere in the state — the difference is which utilities do the delivering. On electricity, ComEd owns the wires, reads the meter, and responds to outages; on gas, North Shore Gas owns the pipes, maintains the meter, and handles emergencies. Those regulated delivery services don't change with a supplier. Supply — the electricity and gas commodities — is the part eligible commercial customers can buy from a licensed competitive supplier: an Alternative Retail Electric Supplier (ARES) on the electric side, or a licensed alternative gas supplier through North Shore Gas's supplier-choice program on the gas side. A supplier contract fixes the price and terms of that supply portion only; ComEd and North Shore Gas keep every part of delivery and service.

What shapes energy costs here

• Manufacturing and industrial accounts are demand- and capacity-sensitive — see manufacturing energy procurement. Process and equipment loads can create sharp peaks that drive the demand component of the bill.
• Demand charges bill the peak kW an account pulls in a period, independent of total kilowatt-hours, so the timing of heavy equipment matters as much as the total. See commercial demand charges.
• ComEd/PJM capacity applies on the electric side. Because Waukegan is in ComEd/PJM territory, peak behavior on the grid's highest-load hours feeds a capacity tag (the PLC) that carries into future supply cost — a reason to look at interval data for larger accounts.
• Gas procurement follows North Shore Gas, so the territory, supplier-choice program, and delivery components are the North Shore Gas ones, not Nicor's. Winter heating and any process load make gas a seasonal cost worth procuring on its own terms.
• Institutional and commercial accounts benefit from supply comparison and bill review to confirm rate class and contract status.

Two utilities, two procurement paths

One practical consequence of Waukegan's setup is that a facility here manages two distinct delivery relationships — ComEd for electricity and North Shore Gas for gas — and the procurement paths run through different programs. The electric side follows the ComEd/PJM framework, with a licensed ARES pricing supply and a capacity tag driven by peak behavior. The gas side follows North Shore Gas's own service area and supplier-choice program, with its own delivery components. Treating the gas account as if it were on Nicor is a genuine error that leads to the wrong territory rules and the wrong program — which is exactly why confirming North Shore Gas on the bill is step one.

Contract structure and timing apply on both sides. Supply may be a fixed price for a set term, giving budget certainty, or an index/pass-through arrangement that moves with the market. Default supply resets on the utility's schedule and existing contracts can roll into evergreen terms if a renewal date slips by, so tracking each end date — electric and gas separately — keeps both decisions on the facility's timeline. Neither structure promises a lower cost; the point is a deliberate, correctly-scoped decision for each commodity.

Getting started

Start by confirming the two delivery utilities from recent bills — ComEd for electricity and North Shore Gas for gas — and whether the account is energy-only or demand-billed. Then gather the account and meter numbers, the rate class on each, current supplier contract end dates, and, for demand-billed accounts, 12 months of usage plus interval data. Provide 12 months of electric and gas bills for a Waukegan facility, and the account can be reviewed and priced on matched terms through the procurement process. No savings figure is promised in advance — the goal is an accurate, utility-correct comparison across both commodities.