Utilities in Orlando — Orlando, Florida

Orlando, the county seat of Orange County, Florida, is served by a layered utility structure in which multiple public entities deliver distinct services depending on whether a customer resides inside city limits or in unincorporated Orange County. The dominant utility is the Orlando Utilities Commission (OUC), a municipally owned public utility established in 1923 by Special Act of the Florida Legislature to provide electric and water service. As documented by Drive Electric USA, OUC is the second-largest municipal utility in Florida by customer count, serving more than 240,000 customers across the City of Orlando, portions of unincorporated Orange County, and St. Cloud in Osceola County.

Beyond OUC, the City of Orlando's Public Works Department operates two separate divisions — the Water Reclamation Division for wastewater collection and treatment, and the Solid Waste Division for residential and commercial garbage, recycling, and yard waste. Residents in unincorporated Orange County outside OUC's water service area are served by the Orange County Utilities Department, a distinct governmental entity headquartered at 9150 Curry Ford Road. This parallel structure reflects Orlando's position as a city embedded within a county that independently delivers utility services to non-municipal residents.

The City of Orlando's official records classify OUC as a statutory commission and multi-jurisdictional advisory board entity created by Special Act of the Florida Legislature in 1923. OUC's five-member Board of Commissioners includes the Mayor of Orlando as a statutory participant, creating a direct linkage between the elected city government and utility governance — a structure that distinguishes Orlando from cities served by investor-owned utilities regulated by the Florida Public Service Commission.

This governance arrangement means that decisions on electric rates, solar compensation, and infrastructure investment are made by a board with direct democratic accountability through the mayor's seat. Public proceedings before the OUC board, including the contested PeakSHIFT hearings in late 2024, have drawn residents, clean energy advocates, and journalists, as reported by WKCF (Click Orlando) and The Invading Sea.

The City of Orlando's Public Works Department manages wastewater and solid waste independently of OUC. These two functions — the Water Reclamation Division and the Solid Waste Division — operate as municipal city services rather than under OUC's statutory commission structure. For the roughly 311,732 residents counted in the U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2023, determining which entity provides a given utility service depends on both service type and geographic location within or outside city boundaries.

OUC owns and operates the Curtis H. Stanton Energy Center in east Orange County, which the commission describes as the most diverse generating site in Florida in terms of fuel mix, incorporating natural gas, landfill methane gas, coal, and solar generation. The OUC Energy Integrated Resource Plan (EIRP) Roadmap — a 30-year clean energy planning document — calls for significantly reducing coal use by 2025 and eliminating it entirely no later than 2027.

OUC has also invested in distributed solar infrastructure. According to an OUC official news release, the commission opened a 2-megawatt floating solar array at 5301 S. Conway Road in Orlando, consisting of two arrays and more than 3,400 solar panels. OUC describes this installation as one of the largest floating solar arrays in the United States and the largest in Florida at the time of its opening.

Orlando's water supply is drawn from the Lower Floridan Aquifer, a deep limestone formation underlying the Central Florida region. OUC subjects its drinking water to more than 20,000 chemical and bacteriological quality tests annually, according to the commission. The city's chain-of-lakes geography — with hundreds of freshwater lakes including Lake Eola in the downtown core — shapes the hydrological context in which both OUC's water operations and the city's wastewater and stormwater systems function.

Wastewater collection and treatment within the City of Orlando is managed by the Water Reclamation Division, which operates under the City of Orlando's Public Works Department. The division's official documentation states that it meets and exceeds state and federal standards for the processing and reclamation of sanitary sewer water. This division is separate from OUC and does not fall under the 1923 statutory commission structure; it is a direct city department function.

Residential and commercial garbage collection, recycling, and yard waste services are provided by the Solid Waste Division, also within the Public Works Department. This division handles curbside residential pickup as well as commercial solid waste services for businesses operating within city limits. Like the Water Reclamation Division, it operates independently of OUC's electric and water service functions.

Together, these two divisions represent the municipal component of Orlando's utility infrastructure that exists outside OUC's statutory mandate. Residents within city limits thus interact with at least three distinct public entities for comprehensive utility service: OUC for electric and water, the Water Reclamation Division for wastewater, and the Solid Waste Division for garbage and recycling.

Residents of unincorporated Orange County — areas outside the City of Orlando and other incorporated municipalities — receive water, wastewater, reclaimed water, and solid waste services from the Orange County Utilities Department, a separate governmental entity from OUC. The department is headquartered at 9150 Curry Ford Road in Orlando and maintains a 24-hour emergency line at 407-836-2777, as documented by the Orange County Florida Newsroom.

The Orange County, Florida government website describes Orange County Utilities as providing these four service categories to county citizens, explicitly distinct from OUC's municipal commission structure. Reclaimed water service — treated wastewater redistributed for irrigation and other non-potable uses — is one element that Orange County Utilities offers to its service area, reflecting a broader regional emphasis on water conservation in Central Florida's inland environment.

The coexistence of OUC (covering the city and adjacent unincorporated portions for electric and water), the City of Orlando's Public Works divisions (for city wastewater and solid waste), and Orange County Utilities (for unincorporated county residents across all utility categories) means that geographic address is the primary determinant of which agencies serve a given property in the Orlando metropolitan area.

In December 2024, OUC's Board of Commissioners approved PeakSHIFT, a multiyear program to restructure electric service pricing. Per the November 2024 OUC PeakSHIFT news release, beginning in early 2026 the program introduced a DemandLevel Pricing structure applying a fixed monthly charge of $5, $10, or $15 based on each customer's monthly peak usage. OUC described the change as revenue-neutral and designed to promote affordability and grid sustainability.

One component, TruNet Solar, took effect July 1, 2025, establishing a compensation rate of 4 cents per kilowatt-hour for rooftop solar customers on new installations — a decrease of approximately 6 cents from prior net metering rates, as reported by Bay News 9 / Spectrum News 13. The change drew public opposition from clean energy advocates at the December 2024 OUC board hearing. WKCF (Click Orlando) reported that Orlando has committed to 100% renewable energy by 2050, with advocates arguing that reducing solar compensation contradicted that goal. The Invading Sea also documented civil society concerns about the pace of OUC's transition away from coal and natural gas infrastructure.

Separately, the OUC amended pricing plan confirms the commission's stated long-term goal of achieving net zero CO2 emissions by 2050, consistent with the 30-year trajectory outlined in the OUC Energy Integrated Resource Plan Roadmap.