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The average Tucson Electric Power Co. bill for residential customers is scheduled to go up $1.26 in June.

In a 3-2 vote Thursday, the Arizona Corporation Commission approved a staff-revised plan for the company to increase consumer participation in renewable energy. That means an increase in the tariff TEP already charges to offset the cost of ramping up renewable energy. The tariff will go from 35 cents a month to $1.61 a month, on average. The tariff is capped at $2 a month.

The commission has mandated that public utilities generate 15 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2025. Utilities such as TEP are requesting approval of these tariffs in part to help them move toward compliance.

The approved plan replaced two options TEP had presented to the commission.

Chairman Mike Gleason and Commissioner Gary Pierce voted against this version of the plan.

"TEP has been the expert in this field for five or six years," Gleason said. "They're the ones that have had the experience. And our staff decided not to go with them. And three commissioners decided they would go with staff and not the experts."

If the plan fails, TEP now can blame ACC staff, he said.

But Commissioner Kris Mayes said the plan will dramatically increase the use of solar energy in Arizona.

"TEP's proposal diverged pretty wildly from some of the other plans proposed by some of the other utilities," she said.

Joe Salkowski, a TEP spokesman, said the company is excited to get started on the program despite fears about meeting goals with the fees that were approved.

"For us to meet the (commission-imposed) goal this year, we would need 390 customers to install solar systems," he said. "To achieve those higher levels we believe we needed a higher incentive."

The approved incentive — $3,000 per kilowatt-hour of installed renewable energy device — is the same incentive that's been in place and attracted only 117 customers last year, Salkowski said.

But Mayes said the same incentive applies to all the electric utilities in the state.

Arizona Public Service Co. also got a renewable-energy plan approved this week. The APS plan will raise customers' 44-cent monthly tariff to $1.32, on average.

UniSource Energy Services — which has the same parent company as TEP and serves customers in Nogales — will have similar fees to the TEP plan that will take effect at the same time.