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Duke Energy Progress N.C. Rate Review Request

Duke Energy Progress North Carolina Rate Review Request

How we're building a smarter, more reliable energy future for our customers.

We’ve made significant improvements over the last several years to meet the expectations of our growing customer base in North Carolina. These investments – 75% of spending planned over the next three years – focus on strengthening the grid to make it more resistant to outages from severe weather and improving resiliency to restore power faster when outages occur.

Why now?

There is never a good time to request a rate review, and we’re sensitive to the financial pressures our customers face. That’s why we work hard to keep customer bills as low as possible. We took numerous cost-cutting measures to delay the filing of this application, such as reducing our operating costs by more than $100 million since our last rate case – we haven’t initiated a rate case since 2019.

Since our last rate case, we have invested more than $3 billion in our generation, transmission and distribution infrastructure to strengthen the grid against storms and reduce outage times; advance the clean energy transition, including compliance with federal and state regulations; and maintain the high level of reliable service that our customers and communities expect.

Customers are already benefitting from those infrastructure investments today, and rates should reflect investments made on their behalf. Further delay would only result in a larger requested increase at a later date.

Our customers count on us to deliver affordable, reliable and increasingly clean energy every day. Duke Energy Progress rates in North Carolina are consistently below the rates charged by other utilities, and we remain committed to keeping them as low as possible.

Through smart investments, we’re working hard to meet customers’ expectations and build the foundation for a smarter energy future from which all North Carolinians can benefit. These investments are the main reason for the proposed rate increase.

INCREASING RELIABILITY AND RESILIENCY

  • Technology is transforming North Carolina and changing the way customers use electricity and interact with their electric providers. Reliability remains essential as our state’s increasingly connected population continues to expand. Today, the need for consistent, reliable service is the expectation of every home and business, especially given the shift to hybrid work arrangements – even as that reliability is challenged by the increasing frequency of severe weather events and the threat of grid attacks.
  • We have already made significant infrastructure improvements to improve reliability and reduce outages. Over the past five years (2018-2022 YTD), new self-healing technology helped avoid more than 1.3 million extended customer outages, saving more than 3 million hours of total lost outage time for customers.
  • This rate case also includes nearly $3.3 billion in future grid infrastructure improvements that are projected to reduce customer outages while enabling renewables, EVs, and supporting economic development and new jobs.

OPERATIONAL EXCELLENCE AND ENHANCING THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE

  • Customers today want more streamlined options and versatility, driven by information about how they consume energy and by tools that help them manage their consumption.
  • Duke Energy Progress has taken steps to continuously improve the service our customers receive from, and the interactions they have with, the company since our last base rate increase.
  • Since the previous rate case, Duke Energy Progress has reduced our annual operating costs by more than $100 million (2018 to 2021). Those savings will be passed on to customers in this case.

ACHIEVING A CLEANER AND SMARTER ENERGY FUTURE

  • Duke Energy Progress is actively pursuing an orderly transition toward a clean, secure energy future by closing the final chapters on our reliance on coal-fired generation and moving forward with lower fuel-dependent generation resources.
  • The voices of our customers and our investors have become increasingly clear on this topic – they expect us to invest in cleaner power and are making economic development decisions based on those expectations.

Duke Energy Progress rate case at a glance

On Oct. 6, 2022, Duke Energy Progress asked the North Carolina Utilities Commission (NCUC) to review its rates as the company continues working to strengthen its grid, reduce carbon emissions and improve the customer experience. For the first time, this rate case will include a three-year plan to fund system improvements. The NCUC will thoroughly review this plan, which will limit annual rate increases and give customers more cost certainty.

If approved by the NCUC, rates for a typical residential customer using 1,000 kilowatt hours (kWh) per month would increase as follows:

  • Oct. 1, 2023, a monthly increase of $14.72 – from $126.43 to $141.15.
  • Oct. 1, 2024, a monthly increase of $5.62 – from $141.15 to $146.77.
  • Oct. 1, 2025, a monthly increase of $5.21 – from $146.77 to $151.98.

Additional resources

Public Notice

Customer Rates Increase on June 1, 2023

N.C. Utilities Commission
Public Hearings

In-Person Hearings
Notice of Public Hearing
Virtual Public Hearing - April 20, 2023 – 6 p.m. – Registration required to speak

Thumbnail image of a news release Read the news release.
Thumbnail image of a fact sheet
View the fact sheet.

Thumbnail representation of rate case video title card.
View video. 


Proposed rate changes by customer class

222601 Rates by Customer Class Table 2
This table shows the average impact of the proposed changes for each customer class. The specific increase to individual customers will vary depending on the rate they pay. The three general service rate classes include both commercial and industrial customers.

What's Next?

Chart showing the steps in the rate making process.

Frequently Asked Questions

Duke Energy Progress North Carolina Rate Review Request

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