Regulatory Matters

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2025

Regulation

Water Utility Services, excluding non-tariffed activities, are subject to rate regulation based on cost recovery and meets the criteria of accounting guidance for rate-regulated operations under ASC Topic 980, which affects the timing of the recognition of certain revenues and expenses. H2O America’s consolidated financial statements reflect the actions of regulators in the rate-making process. The ratemaking process is intended to provide revenues sufficient to recover normal operating expenses, provide funds for replacement of water infrastructure and produce a fair and reasonable return on stockholder common equity.

Water Utility Services, excluding non-tariffed activities, recognizes regulatory assets for incurred costs that are deemed probable of recovery from customers. Also, Water Utility Services recognizes regulatory liabilities for amounts expected to be refunded to customers in the ratemaking process and for amounts collected in advance of the related expenditures. Regulatory assets or liabilities are also recognized for special revenue programs such as WCMA and WRA in accordance with guidance on alternative revenue programs under ASC Topic 980. Application of ASC Topic 980, including determining whether recovery is probable, requires significant judgment by management and includes assessing evidence that may exist prior to regulatory

authorization, including regulatory rules and decisions, historical ratemaking practices, and other facts and circumstances that would indicate that recovery or refund is probable.

If the regulated utility determines that it is no longer probable that regulatory assets or liabilities would be recovered or refunded through the regulatory process, or if the utility ceased to be subject to rate regulation, the affected regulatory assets and liabilities would be derecognized with a corresponding adjustment to income in the period in which that determination was made.

SJWC has established balancing accounts for the purpose of tracking the under-collection or over-collection associated with expense changes and the revenue authorized by the CPUC to offset those expense changes. SJWC’s Full Cost Balancing Account (“FCBA”) tracks water supply costs and energy consumption. The Monterey Water Revenue Adjustment (“MWRAM”) balancing account tracks the difference between the revenue received for actual metered sales through the tiered volumetric rate and the revenue that would have been received with the same actual metered sales if a uniform rate would have been in effect.

SJWC also maintains memorandum accounts to track impacts due to catastrophic events, certain unforeseen water quality expenses related to new federal and state water quality standards, energy efficiency, water conservation, water tariffs, and other approved activities or as directed by the CPUC. The Water Contamination Litigation Memorandum Account (“WCLMA”) allows SJWC to track net proceeds and costs resulting from water contamination litigation. The WCMA allows SJWC to track lost revenue, net of related water costs, associated with reduced sales due to water conservation and associated calls for water use reduction, both mandatory and voluntary. SJWC records the lost revenue captured in the WCMA balancing accounts, including amounts related to a 20-basis point reduction in the authorized return on equity per the terms of the WCMA. Applicable drought surcharges collected are used to offset the revenue losses tracked in the WCMA. Mandatory water conservation requirements from Santa Clara Valley Water District (“Valley Water”) ended on April 11, 2023, which also ended SJWC’s Mandatory Conservation Plan, that included drought allocations and surcharges. On October 2, 2023, the CPUC approved the continuation of WCMA and Water Conservation Expense Memorandum Account under the voluntary call for conservation effective April 20, 2023. All balancing accounts and memorandum accounts not included for recovery or refund in current customer rates will be reviewed by the CPUC in SJWC’s next general rate case or at the time an individual account balance reaches a threshold of 2% of authorized revenue, whichever occurs first. On December 19, 2024, the CPUC issued General Rate Case Decision No. 24-12-077, which approved a recovery of $15,792 in balancing and memorandum accounts from customers through a 12-month surcharge effective January 1, 2025.

CWC has been authorized by PURA to utilize WRA, a decoupling mechanism, to mitigate risks associated with changes in demand. The WRA is used to reconcile actual water demands with the demands projected in the most recent general rate case and allows the company to implement a surcharge or sur-credit as necessary to recover or refund the revenues approved in the general rate case. The WRA allows the company to defer, as a regulatory asset or liability, the amount by which actual revenues deviate from the revenues allowed in the most recent general rate proceedings.

Regulatory Assets and Liabilities

Regulatory assets and liabilities are comprised of the following as of December 31:


	2025		2024
Regulatory assets:
Income tax temporary differences (a) (q)	$	204,384	180,103
MWRAM (b)	8,553		9,985
Business combinations debt premium (c) (q)	9,772		12,313
Employee benefit costs (d) (q)	5,823		6,370
Catastrophic event memorandum accounts (“CEMA”) (p)	127		986
Revenue adjustment mechanisms (e) (q)	7,931		5,024
Customer Assistance Program (“CAP”) balancing account (f)	3,696		6,599
Water supply costs (i)	847		—
Unrecognized pensions and other postretirement benefits (g) (q)	—		3,177
2022 general rate case interim memorandum account (h)	—		3,392
Other (j)	13,729		14,278
Total regulatory assets	254,862		242,227
Less: current regulatory asset (k)	8,315		18,172
Total regulatory assets, less current portion	$	246,547	224,055
Regulatory liabilities:
Cost of removal (l)	$	394,391	364,398
Future income tax benefits due to customers (m)	82,285		84,128
Unrecognized pensions and other postretirement benefits (g)	32,996		27,872
PFAS legal settlement proceeds (r)	24,682		—
Employee benefit costs (d)	8,771		1,137
Revenue adjustment mechanisms (e)	—		1,122
Water supply costs (i)	—		3,386
Other (n)	3,672		2,798
Total regulatory liabilities	546,797		484,841
Less: current regulatory liabilities (o)	—		1,122
Total regulatory liabilities, less current portion	$	546,797	483,719

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(a)Consists primarily of temporary income tax differences that are flowed through to customers, which will be recovered in future rates as these temporary differences reverse. The company expects to recover regulatory assets related to plant depreciation income tax temporary differences over the lives of the plant assets, which are between 5 to 100 years.

(b)MWRAM is described in the previous section.

(c)Consists of debt fair value adjustments recognized through purchase accounting for the completed merger with CTWS in 2019.

(d)Includes deferrals of pension and other postretirement benefit expense, cost of accrued benefits for vacation, and group health insurance.

(e)Consists of WRA and WCMA, which are described in the previous section.

(f)Represents costs associated with SJWC’s CAP.

(g)Represents actuarial losses and gains and prior service cost that have not yet been recognized as components of net periodic benefit cost for certain pension and other postretirement benefit plans.

(h)Represents the difference between revenues collected in interim rates in effect as of January 1, 2022 and revenues that would result from rates authorized in SJWC’s 2022 general rate case retroactive to January 1, 2022.

(i)Reflects primarily SJWC’s FCBA which tracks differences in actual water supply costs compared to amounts assumed in base rates, including applicable changes and variations in costs and quantities that affect the overall mix of the water supply.

(j)Other includes other balancing and memorandum accounts and regulatory mechanisms, deferred costs for certain information technology activities, asset retirement obligations, tank painting, well reconditioning and rate case expenses.

(k)Primarily relates to SJWC’s balancing and memorandum account surcharge in accordance with Decision No. 24-12-077 and the current portion of CWC’s deferred well redevelopment and rate case costs.

(l)Represents amounts collected in rates from customers for estimated costs to retire assets at the end of their expected useful lives before the costs are incurred.

(m)On December 22, 2017, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (the "Tax Act”) was signed into law. The Tax Act included a reduction in the federal income tax rate from 35% to 21%. The rate reduction was effective on January 1, 2018 and resulted in a regulatory liability for the excess deferred income taxes. The benefit of amortization of excess deferred income taxes flows back to the customers under current normalization rules and agreed upon methods with the commissions.

(n)Other includes other balancing and memorandum accounts and regulatory mechanisms, and other regulatory mechanisms.

(o)Primarily relates to the current portion of WRA.

(p)The CPUC has authorized water utilities to activate CEMA accounts in order to track savings and costs related to SJWC’s response to catastrophic events, which includes external labor and materials, increases in bad debt from suspension of shutoffs for non-payment, waived deposits and reconnection fees, and divergence from actual versus authorized usage. The balances primarily relate to expenses associated with SJWC’s response to COVID-19, including bad debt.

(q)Generally not earning a return either by interest on the regulatory asset or as a component of rate base at the allowed rate of return.

(r)Primarily relates to legal settlements received by SJWC and CWC from ongoing PFAS water contamination litigation against manufacturers which will be used to offset future costs incurred, recorded as Contributions in Aid of Construction (“CIAC”), or returned to customers through future rates. WCLMA has been established to track net proceeds and costs resulting from water contamination litigation related to SJWC.