This story is a partnership between Grist and WBEZ, a public radio station serving the Chicago metropolitan region. Electricity prices have been rising across much of the country, and Illinois is among the states seeing the sharpest increases. Over the past five years, prices have shot up by about a third on average across the state, and some regions have seen increases of nearly 50 percent. According to the Illinois Commerce Commission, more than 170,000 disconnection notices were mailed ou...