Somewhere on your ComEd bill there are line items with names like ETAC, ZEA, CFRA and REA. They are small individually, they are never explained, and they are a reliable way for a consultant to look thorough while telling you nothing useful.
The filed tariff answers the only question that matters about them, and it answers it in one sentence each.
What the tariff says
Four riders in ComEd's Schedule of Rates carry, word for word, the same applicability statement: this rider is applicable to all retail customers. All four apply across Rates BES, BESH, BEST and RDS, which between them cover essentially every customer ComEd serves.
Rider ETAC, the Energy Transition Assistance Charge, exists to give effect to Section 605-1075 of the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity Law.
Rider ZEA, the Zero Emission Adjustment, gives effect to subsection 16-108(k) of the Public Utilities Act.
Rider CFRA, the Carbon-Free Resource Adjustment, gives effect to the same subsection.
Rider REA, the Renewable Energy Adjustment, likewise.
Read that structure and the answer to the title question follows. These are not ComEd's pricing decisions. They are mechanisms by which the utility collects amounts the Illinois legislature directed to be collected, applied to everybody. There is no eligibility test to fail, no class to move into, and no negotiation to have.
Switching suppliers does not remove them
This is the misunderstanding worth correcting, because it is the one that costs people money.
Your bill has two halves. Supply is the electricity itself, and you can buy it from ComEd or from a retail electric supplier. Delivery is getting it to you over ComEd's wires, and you cannot buy that from anyone else.
The riders above are collected regardless of who supplies you. Changing supplier changes the supply half of the bill. It does not change these lines, and any quote that shows them shrinking is showing you something that will not happen.
The same logic applies to a demand charge, and for the same reason. If a saving is quoted against your total bill rather than against the supply portion specifically, ask which lines it comes off. That one question sorts credible quotes from the rest quickly.
What we are not going to publish here
We are not publishing the current rates for these riders.
Not because they are secret, but because they change on their own schedules through reconciliation and regulatory filings, and a number typed into an article ages badly and silently. Every figure we publish is reconciled against a real bill and carries the period it belongs to. A rider factor pulled off a filing and left on a page for two years is exactly the kind of confident, stale, unsourced number this site exists to argue against.
The applicability is the durable finding. It is written into the riders themselves, it has not changed, and it is what decides your options. Your own bill carries the current amounts, and it is the authority for your account.
Where the money actually is
If these four are not avoidable, the useful question becomes where to spend the attention instead. Take your own bill and work out what proportion of it these lines are. For most commercial accounts the answer is a small single digit percentage, and that number is the entire ceiling on what any effort directed at them could achieve. Knowing the ceiling is what tells you to stop.
Then look at the two lines where the ceiling is high.
The demand charge, if your bill has a line priced in dollars per kilowatt. It is set by a single measured interval, which means a very small change in behaviour can move a large charge. This is almost always the highest ratio of money to effort on a commercial bill.
The supply rate, which is genuinely contestable because you can buy it elsewhere, and where the right answer depends on your load shape rather than on the headline price.
Those two are where a bill actually moves. The riders are where an audit goes to look busy.
How to use this when someone offers you a bill review
A bill review is a legitimate service and some are good. The way to tell is to ask what the reviewer proposes to change.
If the answer involves finding errors in statutory riders, the reviewer either does not know they are applicable to all retail customers or is counting on you not knowing. If the answer is about the rate class you are billed under, the determinant setting your billed demand, or the supply arrangement matched to your load shape, those are real levers with real numbers behind them.
The riders are worth understanding precisely so that you can recognise which conversation you are in.
What is Rider ETAC on my ComEd bill?
The Energy Transition Assistance Charge, a rider that gives effect to Section 605-1075 of the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity Law. Its own text states that it is applicable to all retail customers.
What are Rider ZEA, CFRA and REA?
The Zero Emission Adjustment, Carbon-Free Resource Adjustment and Renewable Energy Adjustment. All three give effect to subsection 16-108(k) of the Illinois Public Utilities Act, and each states in its own text that it is applicable to all retail customers.
Can I avoid these charges by switching electricity suppliers?
No. Each of these riders states that it is applicable to all retail customers. Switching supplier changes the supply portion of your bill; these lines and your delivery charges are unaffected.
Are these charges negotiable?
No. They are collection mechanisms for amounts directed by Illinois statute, applied across all retail customers, with no eligibility test and no rate class that escapes them.
Where should I look instead to reduce a ComEd bill?
At any charge priced in dollars per kilowatt, because it is set by a single measured interval and moves on small changes, and at the supply portion, which is genuinely contestable and depends on your load shape.