By Martha Quillin
Duke Energy expects North Carolina’s electricity demands to soar over the next 15 years and says it will meet the need reliably and affordably by building new gas and nuclear power plants and extending the lives of its aging coal-fired plants.
Clean-energy advocates have assailed the company’s new “Carbon Plan” update, saying it commits the state to old-school polluting technologies or unproven designs that could cost rate-payers billions of dollars while better, cheaper options are available.
“North Carolina is the top state for business, and our focus is on ensuring Duke Energy’s low energy rates continue to support this region’s economic success,” Kendal Bowman, Duke Energy’s North Carolina president, said in a statement accompanying the plan’s release this week. “By expanding our diverse generation portfolio and maximizing our existing power plants to meet growth needs, we will ensure reliable energy while saving all our customers money.”
Gov. Josh Stein and public interest groups including NC WARN, the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, the Sierra Club, Vote Solar and the Southern Environmental Law Center say the plan ultimately would result in higher bills for customers and make it harder for North Carolina to meet its goal of carbon neutrality by 2050.
“Duke Energy is retreating from the state’s clean energy future that can continue to bring good jobs and lower costs to North Carolina,” Stein said in a statement. “In its plan, Duke has eliminated wind, reduced solar, and delayed nuclear while increasing our dependence on price-volatile natural gas and coal. I call on the utilities commission to require significant changes to secure a clean and affordable energy future for North Carolinians.”
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Jim Warren, executive director of NC WARN, said Duke Energy also has an incentive to overestimate the amount of electricity that will be needed in the future to justify additional construction, the cost of which is passed on to rate-payers. NC WARN has challenged Duke Energy in the past over plans to add nuclear reactors at its Shearon Harris plant in New Hill, southwest of Raleigh.
Duke’s new resource plan “continues the horrible record of one of the world’s worst climate polluters,” Warren said. “Duke proposes to greatly increase methane gas for power and experimental nuclear plants while extending its burning of coal for at least 15 years. The plan slashes projections for large-scale solar and continues its suppression of rooftop solar. This would put billions into the rate system, leading power bills to double or triple over time while driving even more weather disasters that are devastating North Carolina communities.
“We call on Governor Stein and other state leaders to denounce and rein in this out-of-control corporate monopoly.”
Warren said that even if Duke’s estimates about rapid future growth in manufacturing pan out, the utility and state legislators could create incentives for companies to install solar collection and battery systems that would reduce strain on the electrical grid and provide some security against outages.
“Solar is the cheapest form of electricity ever created,” Warren said. Especially in cases where the state offers incentives for companies to locate here, Warren said, “There should be a requirement that these places use some of their investment up front to make their facilities as self-generating as possible in terms of their energy use. Why wouldn’t you? You have all these huge buildings and the roofs and walls and parking areas are empty. We should be having solar and storage put on all these places.”