One plan, three names, two clocks
Search for Green Mountain free nights and you land in a small maze. Green Mountain's own compare-plans page shows a card called Pollution Free All Nighter: "Enjoy free electricity every night from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m., powered by 100% clean, renewable energy made from wind." Click View Plan Details and you arrive at a page for a plan named Pollution Free Nights, which promises free nights from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. There is also a third night product, Solar All Nighter for EVs, which is not a free-nights plan at all: it sells a reduced price, not a zero price, from 8:00 p.m. to 5:59 a.m. What Green Mountain sells at checkout, as of August 2026, is Pollution Free Nights, in 12- and 24-month terms.
Notice the hour that moved. The compare page says free starts at 8 p.m. The plan's own detail page says 9 p.m. The Electricity Facts Label, the document that governs your bill, settles it: "There is no charge applied to usage from 9:00 PM to 6:00 AM." One of Green Mountain's own pages promises an extra free hour that the contract does not deliver. Sign up expecting 8 p.m. and your dishwasher runs at full price for an hour every night.
This review does two jobs. First, the free-nights math, which is unusually clean here and still does not work for most homes. Second, the green premium: Green Mountain is NRG Energy's premium renewable brand (NRG also owns Reliant and Direct Energy), and on our live feed its flat plans cost 4 to 5 cents per kWh more than other companies' equally 100% renewable plans. The label has a price. We put a number on it.
Claims vs. fine print
Four claims on the front. Four footnotes on the back. Here they are, side by side.
The mailer says
"Enjoy free electricity every night from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m., powered by 100% clean, renewable energy made from wind." (the All Nighter card on Green Mountain's compare-plans page)
The fine print says
The Electricity Facts Label for the plan that card links to says the free window starts at 9:00 p.m., not 8 p.m. The plan's own detail page also says 9 p.m. The compare page promises one more free hour than the contract delivers, as of August 7, 2026. The EFL is the document that governs your bill.
Source: greenmountainenergy.com compare-plans page vs. Pollution Free Nights 12 EFL, Oncor territory, dated August 1, 2026
The mailer says
"Get 100% renewable energy for FREE every night."
The fine print says
The free is unusually complete. From 9:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m., both the energy charge and Oncor's per-kWh delivery charge are $0.00, which most free-nights rivals do not match. What pays for it is the other 15 hours: 19.6 cents of energy plus 6.0 cents of delivery, 25.7 cents all-in on every daytime kWh, roughly double the 12.8-cent flat no-gimmick Oncor floor as of August 7, 2026.
Source: Pollution Free Nights 12 EFL, Oncor territory, August 1, 2026; ElectricRates.org live Oncor feed, August 7, 2026
The mailer says
"If you use more electricity at night than the day, you should get it for free." (the plan page's pitch)
The fine print says
Green Mountain's own EFL prices the plan assuming 35% of your usage lands in the free window, meaning the company expects nearly two-thirds of your electricity to bill at the 25.7-cent day rate. To beat the cheapest flat Oncor plan you need about 52% of your usage between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m., every month. The pitch describes a customer the plan's own pricing assumes you are not.
Source: Pollution Free Nights 12 EFL average-price assumptions; ElectricRates.org calculation against the August 7, 2026 Oncor feed
The mailer says
"100% clean, renewable energy made from wind."
The fine print says
True the way every Texas green plan is true: through renewable energy certificates. The EFL's own footnote says it plainly: "You will not have electricity from a specific generation facility delivered directly to your service address," and "We will rely on system power from the grid to serve our customers' minute by minute consumption." The certificates are real and the mechanism is legitimate. It is also the same mechanism behind 100% renewable flat plans selling for 13.3 to 13.9 cents from other companies on the same day.
Source: Pollution Free Nights EFL renewable-content footnote; ElectricRates.org live Oncor feed, August 7, 2026
The rate, straight from the EFL
Green Mountain shows prices only after you enter a ZIP code, but the documents behind them are public once you do. We pulled the Oncor-territory Electricity Facts Labels dated August 1, 2026 on August 7. Pollution Free Nights 12: no base charge, a $4.06 Oncor monthly charge, a 19.6-cent daytime energy charge, 6.0 cents of daytime delivery, and $0.00 for both energy and delivery at night. Advertised averages: 17.5 cents at 500 kWh, 17.1 at 1,000, 16.9 at 2,000, all built on the assumption that 35% of your usage happens between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m. Cancellation fee: $150, waived if you move and can document it.
The 24-month version breaks the usual rule that longer means pricier. Pollution Free Nights 24 charges 18.1 cents by day instead of 19.6 and averages 16.5 cents at 500 kWh, 16.1 at 1,000, and 15.9 at 2,000. The catch is the exit: $295 to leave early instead of $150, and two summers of exposure to a day rate you cannot renegotiate.
Credit where it is due. Most free-nights plans we have reviewed keep billing per-kWh delivery charges during the "free" hours; Green Mountain zeroes them. Its 35% night assumption is modest next to the 41.2% TXU uses to build its advertised averages. And the EFL sits one click past the ZIP box instead of behind a sales call. This is the most honestly constructed plan in the free-nights class. Honest construction is not the same thing as a good price, which is what the math section is for.
One more finding from our live feed: Pollution Free Nights does not appear in the open marketplace feed we monitor. Green Mountain sells it through its own site. The Green Mountain plans that do list publicly ran 17.8 to 22.6 cents at 1,000 kWh on August 7, 2026, and its flat Pollution Free e-Plus plans sat at 18.1, which matters for the second half of this review.
Pollution Free Nights is sold on greenmountainenergy.com, where pricing appears only after you enter a ZIP code; the Electricity Facts Labels are public once you do. The numbers in this review come from the Oncor-territory EFLs dated August 1, 2026, pulled August 7, 2026. The plan does not appear in the open marketplace feed we monitor, so you cannot compare it side by side with other companies' plans there; you have to bring the market to it, which is what this review does.
How the free nights work: 9:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m., delivery included
The window runs 9:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m., every night of the year, weekends included. Nine hours. Your smart meter's interval data decides which kWh fall inside it, and inside it both the energy charge and Oncor's per-kWh delivery charge are zero. The only charge that survives the night is Oncor's $4.06 fixed monthly charge. On this one mechanical point, Green Mountain's free is more honest than Reliant's or TXU's, which keep charging you to deliver the free electricity.
The other 15 hours pay for all of it. From 6:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. every kWh costs 25.7 cents all-in, and those are the hours when a Texas air conditioner does its work, because the afternoon sun does not keep a schedule that suits this plan. Free-nights plans are a bet that you can move your life into the window; time-of-use pricing only pays the people who win that bet twelve months straight.
Two mechanics worth knowing before you sign. First, the plan page advertises the option to change to a different qualifying Green Mountain plan in the first 90 days with no fee, Green Mountain to Green Mountain only, terms and conditions attached. Second, the EFL's estimation clause: if less than half of your smart-meter interval data arrives, Green Mountain allocates the missing usage 65% to the daytime rate and 35% to the free window by formula. When the data fails, your free hours become an estimate, and the estimate leans expensive.
Do the math on 9 free hours
Start with the ceiling. Nine hours out of 24 is 37.5% of the clock. Green Mountain prices the plan assuming you put 35% of your usage there, which is roughly what an ordinary household with an evenly spread day does by accident. In other words, the advertised 17.1-cent average at 1,000 kWh is not a reward for night-owl discipline. It is the price of living normally on this plan: about $171 a month.
Now the market. The cheapest flat no-gimmick Oncor plan on our feed the day we published was 12.8 cents at 1,000 kWh, or $128 a month. That is $43 a month, about $516 a year, cheaper than the free-nights plan at Green Mountain's own assumptions. To close the gap you would need about 52% of your monthly usage inside the 9-to-6 window, every month, for a year. Green Mountain's own pricing model tells you what it thinks of that scenario: it assumes 35%.
The sharpest comparison is Green Mountain against itself. Its flat Pollution Free e-Plus 12, sold on the same website with the same 100% wind label, averages 16.1 cents at 1,000 kWh per its own EFL. At the night share Green Mountain assumes for you, the free-nights 12-month plan costs 17.1. The seller's own documents say its free plan loses to its own flat plan. The 24-month night plan ties the flat plan at 16.1, in exchange for a $295 exit fee. The word free is a pricing structure, not a discount, and here the seller's shelf proves it.
25.7¢
All-in daytime price per kWh (19.6¢ energy + 6.0¢ Oncor delivery), 12-month plan, August 2026
35%
Night-usage share Green Mountain's own EFL assumes to advertise a 17.1-cent average at 1,000 kWh
52%
Usage share needed inside 9 p.m.-6 a.m. to match the 12.8-cent flat Oncor floor (August 2026)
$43/mo
Extra cost vs the cheapest flat no-gimmick plan at 1,000 kWh, using Green Mountain's own assumptions
Fine print, decoded
The five footnotes on the back of the mailer, translated into plain English.
| What the footnote says | What it means |
|---|---|
| "There is no charge applied to usage from 9:00 PM to 6:00 AM." Nighttime Energy Charge: $0.00 per kWh. Oncor Electric Delivery Nighttime Delivery Charges: $0.00. | The free window is genuinely free per kWh, energy and delivery both. Only Oncor's $4.06 monthly charge bills regardless. Among Texas free-nights plans, that completeness is the exception, not the rule. |
| Daytime Energy Charge of 19.6 cents per kWh plus Oncor daytime delivery charges of 6.0 cents per kWh, passed through without mark-up (12-month EFL; the 24-month EFL charges 18.1 cents by day). | Every kWh from 6:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. costs 25.7 cents all-in. That is roughly double the cheapest flat Oncor plan. The free hours are funded right here. |
| "Average price calculation is based on consumption profile over 12 months of 35% of consumption at nighttime." | The advertised 17.1-cent average assumes about a third of your usage is nocturnal, roughly what an ordinary home does without trying. Shift less than that and your real average climbs toward 25.7. |
| Early cancellation fee: $150 on the 12-month plan, $295 on the 24-month. "This fee does not apply if the customer moves, and provides a forwarding address and other evidence that may be requested to verify that the customer moved." | Leaving early costs $150 or $295 unless you move and can prove it. The 24-month plan has the better day rate and the worse handcuffs. |
| "Renewable content for Pollution Free electricity is at least 51% Texas Wind, and up to 49% Wind from U.S facilities outside Texas." The same footnote continues: "You will not have electricity from a specific generation facility delivered directly to your service address... We will rely on system power from the grid to serve our customers' minute by minute consumption." | Your house runs on the same ERCOT grid mix as your neighbor's. The plan buys and retires wind certificates to match your usage on paper. Legitimate, standard, and identical in mechanism to green plans that cost 4 to 5 cents less per kWh. |
| "If less than 50% of the interval data is received from the Transmission Distribution Service Provider or is estimated by Green Mountain Energy, the usage difference... will be applied as 65% at the Daytime Energy Charge and 35% at the Nighttime Energy Charge." | If your smart-meter data goes missing, Green Mountain assigns 65% of the mystery usage to the expensive rate by formula. When the data fails, your free window becomes an estimate. |
The green premium, priced
Green Mountain built its brand on selling only renewable-backed electricity, and it is now NRG Energy's premium green label; NRG also owns Reliant and Direct Energy. Premium is the operative word. On our live Oncor feed on August 7, 2026, Green Mountain's flat 100% renewable e-Plus plans listed at 18.1 cents at 1,000 kWh. Equally 100% renewable flat plans from other companies listed at 13.3 to 13.9 cents on the same feed the same day. Same label, same certificate mechanism, 4 to 5 cents apart. At 1,000 kWh, the gap runs about $45 a month, roughly $540 a year, for the name on the bill.
Why can other brands sell the same label so much cheaper? Because in Texas the label is cheap to make. Texas generates more electricity from wind than any other state, per the U.S. Energy Information Administration, and a retailer greens a plan by buying and retiring renewable energy certificates from that abundance. The certificates are a real, audited instrument, and Green Mountain's own EFL describes the mechanism candidly. But the electrons at your meter are ERCOT grid power on every plan, at 13.3 cents or at 18.1. Green Mountain would point to its sustainability programs and Sun Club grants; whether those are worth $540 a year is a choice you should get to make with the numbers in front of you.
The premium shows up sharpest on Green Mountain's bill-credit plan. Pollution Free Green Savings Plus 24 promises, in its own EFL's words, "A Usage Credit of $150.00 will be included for each billing cycle when your usage on this plan is above or equal to 2,000 kWh." That EFL, dated August 1, 2026, prices it at 23.0 cents at 500 kWh, 22.6 at 1,000, and 14.9 at 2,000, and on our August 7 feed the 22.6 was the priciest 100% renewable listing on the entire Oncor board at 1,000 kWh. Land under the 2,000-kWh cliff and you pay some of the highest green-label prices on the market; credit-cliff plans cut both ways.
One more Green Mountain signature deserves a paragraph: SolarSPARC, a plan family marketed as funding community solar projects. The loyalty mechanic, per Green Mountain's own FAQ: for each June 30 or December 31 you are continuously enrolled, you earn $11 in bill credits, accumulating each year until they cap at $121 a year after five years, paid in Texas through your January bill, and only if you are still a customer when the credit posts. Eleven dollars twice a year, marketed as solar impact. Set it next to the premium: the flat-plan brand gap runs about $45 a month. The credit hands back a sliver of what the premium collects, on the condition that you stay.
What to do instead
For contrast, here is the live Oncor market on the day we published (August 7, 2026). The cheapest all-in plan at 1,000 kWh was 7.0 cents per kWh, but it earns that number with a bill credit that punishes low-usage months; bill-credit plans cut both ways. The cheapest flat plan with no credits, no tiers, and no time windows was 12.8 cents, and the cheapest flat plan carrying the same 100% renewable label as Green Mountain was 13.3 cents. Every plan below publishes its full Electricity Facts Label before you enroll.