News

Duke Energy Rate Hike Webinars – May 13th and 15th

May 13, 1-2 p.m.: Information on Duke Rate Hikes
May 15, 6:30-7:30 p.m.: How to Tell a Compelling Story at the hearings

CARH Testimony at Duke Energy Shareholder Meeting

These two powerful statements — by Satana Deberry of the N.C. Housing Coalition and Patrick Cobb of AARP South Carolina — were offered as testimony at the May 2, 2013 Duke Energy shareholder meeting in Charlotte, NC.

Advocates to Duke Energy: No Rate Hikes for Dirty Fuels

Ratepayers and concerned North and South Carolinians gathered outside Duke Energy’s annual shareholder meeting for a teach-in to highlight community concerns. Duke Energy seeks to raise electricity prices to pay for extending the use of obsolete and dirty power plants that threaten the health of people, the environment, and the economy.

Florida Senate Clamps Down On Nuclear Cost Recovery Law

The Florida Senate today passed a bill that attempts, for the first time, to address the anti-consumer “early cost recovery” law passed in 2006 that allows the state’s big power companies to shift all the financial risk of building new nuclear reactors to its customers.

Florida Senate passes rewrite of nuclear advance fee

SB 1472 imposes new restrictions on the “early cost recovery” law passed in 2006 that allows electric companies to impose pre-construction costs for nuclear projects without any guarantee that the projects will be built. The bill passed unanimously with no discussion and will be sent to the House, which will take up a similar bill next week.

The shocking burden of $800 light bills, News & Observer

Op-Ed by Gene Nichol, director of the Center on Poverty, Work and Opportunity at the UNC School of Law
The poorest citizens in the poorest communities in North Carolina often pay the highest rates for electricity. They are required, in the process, to subsidize the services of others much wealthier than themselves. They also, in some instances, are taxed by municipalities in which they can neither vote nor run for office. The burden of crushing electricity prices thwarts economic development in much of Eastern North Carolina, the state’s poorest region…

Rep. Leo Daughtry, a veteran Republican legislator from Smithfield, has tried repeatedly to curb the wounds the N.C. Eastern Municipal Power Agency inflicts on Eastern North Carolina. “I could tell you story after story of businesses closing down and people having to leave Smithfield because of it,” he says. “Towns can’t prosper because no one wants to pay those bills.”

Progress Energy execs grilled over price breaks for industrial customers, News & Observer

Last year’s merger between Progress Energy and Duke Energy came back to haunt Progress on Monday as critic after critic grilled company executives on sweetheart deals designed to spare large utility customers a rate increase.

Industrial-rate issue for Progress Energy prefigures Duke Energy rate battle in NC, Charlotte Business Journal

The battle that opened the hearing on Progress Energy Carolinas’ proposed 5.5% N.C. rate increase is one that will also figure in Duke Energy Carolinas’ rate review this summer — disagreement over a program the utilities have proposed to cut the power rates of large industrial customers.

Progress Energy tries to bolster case for rate increase, WRAL

Progress Energy called witnesses Monday to testify to the North Carolina Utilities Commission about the need for an electricity rate increase. The utility … reached an agreement in which customers would see a 5.7 percent average increase in rates over a two-year period. Progress originally requested an 11 percent increase. Although the negotiated rate is lower, it remains controversial because it would hit residential customers hardest.

Speakers want more green energy from Duke, The Charlotte Observer

Speakers from an overflow crowd lined up Thursday night to blast Duke Energy for relying on coal and nuclear power while investing comparatively little in energy efficiency and renewable energy. The N.C. Utilities Commission scheduled the Charlotte hearing on the 20-year growth plans filed every other year by Duke Energy Carolinas.

Florida 50+ voters say big bipartisan yes to texting-while-driving ban, beefed-up long-term care services; but no to nuke-cost recovery fees, AARP Florida

The AARP survey found that 59 percent of voters opposed the 2006 nuclear cost recovery law that allows for utilities to charge for nuclear projects regardless of whether they are built. Only 17 percent who responded to the survey supported the law.
HB 4003 by Rep. Michelle Rehwinkel Vasilinda, D-Tallahassee, would repeal the law. House Republican leaders support reviewing the law but have stopped short of calling for a repeal. AARP leaders expressed support for either a repeal or making changes that would increase consumer protection, such as disclosing the cost of nuclear projects on utilities’ bills.

Doing the math on Duke’s rate hike, The Charlotte Observer

Duke Energy Carolinas filed 5,012 pages of written testimony, data analyses and appendices Monday in support of its request for an overall 9.7 percent North Carolina rate hike. Buried in all those numbers is one that’s most relevant to most customers: 14 percent. That’s the increase the majority of residential customers are being asked to pay.

AARP targets Medicaid expansion, texting while driving and nuclear charges as legislative priorities, The Florida Current

Six in 10 Florida voters 50+ oppose current state laws allowing utility companies to charge consumers in advance for nuclear-power plants, which, under the law, consumers may be required to pay for even though they may never be built. Some 44 percent of those polled strongly opposed the fees, while only 5 percent strongly supported them. Again, opposition to advance nuclear cost-recovery fees cuts across party lines, with 43 percent of Republicans, 41 percent of independents and 46 percent of Democrats strongly opposing such fees.

New Centralized Nuclear Plants: Still an Investment Worth Making?, Forbes

Just a few years ago, the US nuclear renaissance seemed at hand. It probably shouldn’t have been.

Duke Energy wants to raise rates again, WMFY News

Just as you started to adjust the family budget to cover a more expensive energy bill from last year’s rate increase, Duke Energy wants to raise rates again.

Duke Energy to file for another rate increase, ABC 11

Duke Energy has told North Carolina utility regulators that it will ask for another rate increase soon.

Duke Energy Carolinas to file for rate increase in February, The Triangle Business Journal

Duke Energy Carolinas has given the North Carolina Utilities Commission official notice that it plans to file its next rate case around Feb. 4.

NC Attorney General to argue against Duke Energy rate increase, WBTV Charlotte

Consumers need to be taken into account when setting utility profit margins and evaluating requests for rate increases, Attorney General Roy Cooper said today as attorneys with his office prepared to argue in court against a rate hike proposed by Duke Energy.

Progress Energy requests 14% rate increase for residential customers, The News & Observer

Progress Energy Carolinas is asking state regulators for a rate increase that would boost the average household electricity bill of its North Carolina customers by nearly $180 a year.

Credibility is hard to come by with Duke Energy, Tampa Bay Times column

This is not a critique of the proposed nuclear power plant in Levy County. Let the engineers, watchdogs and investors debate the details of that plan. This is about something simpler. In some ways, something far more important. This is about credibility.

Senator Mike Fasano Calls Upon Florida Public Service Commission to Follow North Carolina’s Lead

With the recent merger of Duke Energy and Progress Energy the contentious issue of advanced nuclear cost recovery once again takes center stage.  I am pleased that the North Carolina Utilities Commission is holding Progress Energy’s feet to the fire this week as its members put Progress Energy’s former chief executive officer under the spotlight.

Institute Index: Fighting nuclear power’s money grab, Facing South

Date on which the Southern Co. filed a notice with federal securities regulators reporting that its project to build two new reactors at Plant Vogtle in Burke County, Ga. was experiencing massive cost overruns: 5/7/2012

Advocates ready to fight Duke-Progress over recovering nuke costs, The News & Observer

A dozen nonprofit advocacy groups are lining up to fight any effort to make it easier for electric utilities to raise rates to pay for nuclear plants years before the costly plants are built.

Advocates plan fight over nuke plant bill, The Charlotte Observer

Consumer, environmental and anti-nuclear advocates said Monday they will fight proposed state legislation allowing Duke Energy to more easily pass costs of a new nuclear plant on to N.C. customers.

A higher price tag for a nuclear project, NY Times

The flagship project of a hoped-for but not-yet-realized “nuclear renaissance,” the Vogtle 3 and 4 reactors under construction near Augusta, Ga., may cost about $900 million more than had been estimated, the Southern Company said in a filing this week with the Securities and Exchange Commission.