This letter from NC WARN to Duke Energy provides new, hopeful and vitally important background about surging energy storage, the demise of fracked gas, and impacts on the climate crisis. Eight pieces of evidence – summarized after the short letter. Note Forbes Magazine citing Duke Energy as a high-risk laggard.
Duke's 15-Year Plan
Duke Energy’s Integrated Resource Plans (IRPs) are the planning documents the corporation must submit to the NC Utilities Commission. From 2013 to 2015, NC WARN published A Responsible Energy Future for North Carolina, which presented a realistic, clean alternative to Duke Energy’s IRPs. In 2017, we ramped up our arguments by asking engineer Bill Powers to analyze the state’s electricity generation and propose a cleaner path. Learn more about Bill’s NC Clean Path 2025 report. We will continue to argue at the Utilities Commission against Duke’s IRPs, which call for continued burning of climate-killing fossil fuels into the foreseeable future.
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The controversial bill on Duke Energy rates, explained: How does it affect customers? — News & Observer
Senate Bill 559, approved by the Senate, is awaiting approval in the state House, where it is sitting in committee. The bill, which Duke Energy heavily lobbied for, consists of two parts — the first related to storm recovery funding and the second, more controversial part related to expanding rate-setting options.
Duke-backed bill will raise utility rates for all — News & Observer
Duke is making a lot of noise in its attempt to divert attention from the massive cost exposure potential related to the alternative rate mechanism proposal by focusing attention on the securitization section of SB559. Parkdale’s opposition is with Duke’s proposed multi-year ratemaking and return-on-equity banding, which will result in enormous rate hikes on all North Carolinians and businesses.
Opposition to pipeline continues — Rocky Mount Telegram
Rocky Mount residents are joining a chorus of statewide voices decrying the proposed interstate natural gas pipeline through Nash County.Anna Lamb, speaking at the most recent City Council meeting, asked the council to reverse course on the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, a 42-inch natural gas pipeline planned to run about 600 miles from West Virginia to eastern North Carolina. The council announced support of the pipeline in June 2016.
N.C. regulators ignore calls for more hearings on Duke’s long-range plans — Energy News Network
The move was a blow to clean energy groups and more than a dozen Democratic state legislators who wanted more public meetings and an expert witness hearing over Duke’s plan, which calls for deriving 8% of electricity from renewable sources while building a raft of new fossil gas plants and keeping many of its coal plants running past 2033.
Utilities Commission Sides with Duke in 15-year Planning Docket — News Release from NC WARN
Late yesterday the NC Utilities Commission effectively denied NC WARN’s November motion calling for an evidence-based hearing over Duke Energy’s hotly contested 15-year plan to limit renewable power, constantly raise power bills and greatly expand its use of climate-wrecking fracked gas.
SENATE BILL 559 — News & Observer
Letter to the Editor by Jim Warren. Duke Energy’s Senate Bill 559 is indeed a Trojan Horse (oped June 1). The bill – which could be worth tens of billions for Duke – is as lousy as the deceptive process pushing it forward.
Duke Energy’s power play could cost NC consumers – News & Observer by Industry Leader
Duke Energy is pushing a Trojan horse – which, while disguised as legislation to give state regulators more flexibility, would permit Duke to earn excessive profits at customers’ expense without the comprehensive scrutiny it currently receives from regulators.
Democrat Dan Blue should address his conflict of interest with Duke Energy — News & Observer
[NC WARN] says Blue, a Wake County Democrat and the Senate minority leader, has a glaring conflict of interest. He is the lead sponsor of legislation, Senate Bill 559, that would change the state’s utility commission’s rate-setting structure even as Blue’s law firm — which includes his two sons — is representing a holding company tied to Duke Energy in eminent domain cases related to the Atlantic Coast Pipeline.
Public Energy Enemy No. 1 — News Release from NC WARN and EWG
Duke Energy is the largest investor-owned electric utility in the U.S. But a new report by Environmental Working Group reveals another distinction: Its puny investments in renewable energy, schemes to penalize customers who want to go solar, and environmental record make Duke public energy enemy No. 1.