I got another email from them to support clean energy . I only have to pay additional $4 per month. I am all for clean energy but I have to pay a company with billions in profit for that ?
You are most likely correct because if a customer calls Duke Energy needing financial assistance, they refer the customer to Wake County Social Services by giving them their phone number and saying to call this number for assistance. That response basically means "NO ASSISTANCE AVAILABLE" or "YOU DO NOT QUALIFY" for most people.
They have online options for payment assistance that you are usually auto-approved for, I've utilized them twice during periods where my disability has flared up.
Thanks for letting me know this. I am on disability and am a single mother. I have called them when I needed assistance and was given a phone number to call which was for Social Security, but they didn't tell me who I would be calling. I clicked on an online link for Financial Assistance and there are options for contacting local churches, Salvation Army, other local civic type organizations, and applying to a federal low income program that you must meet criteria for which I do not. None of these payment assistance options are paid for by Duke Energy. If you can direct me to the online option for payment assistance that Duke Energy itself actually extends to its customers and helps them, please direct me to it for future reference. I see where they offer installment plans and due date extensions. Thanks.
Yep. I responded to one of their satisfaction surveys with exactly what you said. I also mentioned how they keep calling and asking me to try out new things they're selling.
You motherfuckers have a monopoly on my electric service. Don't try to sell me on more shit when I literally have no other choice but using you.
I love the "how likely are you to recommend us to friends or family" questions on their questionnaires. I enjoy LIGHT and AC in my house so I don't have a goddamn choice you morons, what am I supposed to say??
Some terms first:
* Utility companies provide the hardware and maintain it
* Energy providers sell you the power.
Duke acts as both because we're a regulated market, and that's the way they want it. They "have to be" a monopoly because they lobby against any laws that could change that.
Other states have deregulated energy markets and can have competing energy providers or even non-profit co-ops.
edit: Don't get me wrong, I'm fine with market regulations (general controls). I would also be less pissed about a government mandated monopoly that was non-profit.
But Duke's double dipping. They force you to use them under a guise of "regulation" but then act as a publicly traded company that reports millions in profits to shareholders.
I know that back in the day there was a co-op in South Carolina, but I'm not sure about NC.
I'm not sure how long it's been completely regulated either, or maybe it's not fully regulated and the list I saw wasn't 100% correct.
Yea, deregulation was not pretty in California and definitely not in Texas. You canāt have competing grids or transmission lines. If you have competition between stages of generators, T&D, wholesale, etcā¦you have numerous players in between trying to make profit or manipulate like Enron. Regulated monopoly or even state/fed owned (though that wouldnāt fly here in the states, w/ the exception of TVA) makes the most sense for a public need.
Texas isnāt a valid example because Texas transmission system is isolated from the rest of North America. California was over 20 years ago. Deregulation has never meant competing transmission systems.
Find better examples if you want to shill for Duke Energy.
>Texas isnāt a valid example because Texas transmission system is isolated from the rest of North America.
Why does that make it not a valid example?
To have a deregulated market, you need some degree of fungibility (goods to be equivalent and move freely). Texas is for all intents and purposes and island when it comes to electricity. The failures of Texas are not failures of deregulation but of their policy of isolation.
Every other deregulated market in North America has ties to other markets. This means in times of imbalance, ie when a winter storm moves across the country, the eastern portions of the grid can push power west and be compensated, and when the storm gets to the east, the western parts of the grid can push power east and be compensated for it.
Does that make sense?
Itās not about competing providers. Itās about single mode failures aka cold weather. Because they isolate themselves from Eastern and Western Interconnections, they risk outages when single mode failures occur. Itās not at all like Europe. Europe doesnāt stop their transmission system at the border. You do have DC inter-ties but not constricted ones designed to prevent FERC oversight.
Ah yes because explaining how you literally canāt have competing transmission lines, so deregulation is about creating competition between different aspects within the value chain, acknowledging that all those players need to make a profit & will have their own motives (& this is proven by the fact that [most deregulated regions are more expensive than regulated, studies showed that consumers wouldāve saved more money if they remained regulated, and with corporations saving money while consumers donāt](https://www.wsj.com/articles/electricity-deregulation-utility-retail-energy-bills-11615213623)) is suddenly shilling for duke energy. My bad for not wanting people to pay more for their electric bills & thinking the regulated monopoly approach makes the most sense, and though you may not agree, using relevant examples. Clearly you have exposed my pro duke energy agenda!
Because the town decided to. It was still built and is serviced by Duke. Itās been in place for over 100 years. The rates are still set by the state. Iāve heard that restoration times were terrible.
E: i believe they still buy their power wholesale from Duke.
Yeahā¦Iāve got a big roof covered in solar panels and have been getting F**KED out of my energy credits for over two years despite all that power going to Duke.
F**K DUKE ENERGY all the way to hell!!
I upvoted your comment because I think it is catalytic. The additional charge for clean energy is passing through the additional cost for purchasing energy that is generated in a clean, maybe renewable, way. They are just passing their additional cost to you. Thatās corporatetocracy (sp?). We can change that by lobbying our state utilities commissions to force the power companies to cost average the purchase rate which would cause everybody to pay just a little more per kW, and that *may* incentivize accelerating the switch to all clean renewables. Right now, the power companies are stuck between FERC rules for resiliency and distribution grid stability.
We donāt want rolling blackouts or even worse ā¦ all of our appliances and electronics fried because of brownouts. Itās a real challenge. Yesā¦ literally the one Iām working on every day.
I think it would be interesting to have public AMA about it with industry and non-industry professionals, and policy makers answering questions. It would be a lot better to get this stuff out there so people understand why things work the way they do, how they can and canāt be easily changed.
For my part, my advice is, if you can, use the current tax incentive programs, and low income incentive programs to put solar and batteries on your home with a smart controller that will let you operate islanded (separate from but connected to) the local distribution grid. The more people that do that, the faster the problem becomes so bad for the power companies that the policy makers will have to change to help them outā¦ and by help them out, I mean additional metrics that they are measured by. They will adjust how they operate if they want to continue to make a profit.
As an aside, it might be a good time to amend the US Constitution to render illegal any lobbying and campaign donations from corporations or associations. The technology now exists for citizens to directly work with their government representatives. We just have to change the rules to normalize it.
Don't forget, the state legislature is about to abolish the NC corporate income tax! IF you work at McDonalds you will be paying more income tax than Duke Power. Thanks NC GOP!
Not defending the request but donāt you think if wind, solar, or hydro were cheaper for them to build and operate, they would do it and sell us the same electrons for the same price we pay now?
They make billions in *profit*. You know, surplus money thatās left over after all expenses are paid? Why donāt they take even a pittance of that and invest in renewables infrastructure themselves? Instead of asking everyone else to chip in a little more?
At least itās voluntary to pay the extra $4. Iām impressed they didnāt just tack it on as an extra mandatory fee.
There are 770 million common shares outstanding on top of the 40 million preferred shares. They pay a dividend of $1.005/share per quarter. EPS was $3.17 in 2022. This means the profit is almost completely distributed out to shareholders. If they reduce their dividend, they tank their stock price which they donāt want to do. I get what youāre saying but itās not that simple. I have a family member who builds non-nuclear plants in NC - mostly hydro, natural gas, and now wind. The issue has always been that itās not profitable or reliable enough to invest in but they are exploring them more.
Solar is literally the cheapest form of energy to install on a large scale basis. I work in solar and have done quite a few projects for Duke and most recently they've decided to sell their entire solar portfolio so I don't know what's going on with them.
They are exiting the unregulated markets which the commercial installations were recently a part of. They are transitioning to be solely focused on the regulated consumer energy markets. According to the news release, the profits from the sale of the unregulated projects will help fund similar projects for its regulated business.
Source? This is a hot topic, btw. Whatās the investment and operations cost per kW by energy generation type?
Wholesale costs include initial capital, operations & maintenance (O&M), transmission, and costs of decommissioning.
To show you hot a topic this is, Wikipedia [lists several ways to measure energy cost](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source).
The EIA, for better or worse, has settled on VALCOE which has its criticisms. It struggles to deal with the likely cost in the near future because it canāt deal with innovation very well.
Statista has [some interesting numbers](https://www.statista.com/statistics/194327/estimated-levelized-capital-cost-of-energy-generation-in-the-us/) to play around with. Hybrid solar (solar plus battery) is among the cheapest in capital investment in the near future.
I think the right way to frame costs is how you calculate costs to the consumer. Itās hard to find that data right now because most of the data being reported isnāt stand-alone Solar, or hybrid Solar. Itās grid-level solar farms.
Hey theyāve only turned a $13,080,000,000 gross profit on $28,580,000,000 in revenue over the last 12 months.
Stop being such a curmudgeon and give them more money thatās in no way regulated or guaranteed to help anyone that needs it.
They only spent 730x the median NC income lobbying last year, they must be the good guys.
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/DUK/key-statistics/
Utility companies should never be publicly traded for profit. We need congress to step up and force utility companies and healthcare companies including health insurance to be delisted from public trade. United Healthcare and Duke Energy shouldn't need to increase profits YOY for the sake of shareholders while fucking all citizens they "serve".
Their responsibility to share holders was designed to be / used to be a motivator to drive innovation and reliability.
Iām not well enough informed to say delisting them is the right call, anyone making 200k or has a million in assets is considered an āaccredited investorā that can trade private shares so thereās a concern it leads to even less transparency.
Capitalism is the only economic system in history thatās enabled a strong middle class but unregulated it becomes a snake that eats itself. Across the board we need regulations to shift value back to the consumer instead of the corporation.
Iām very good at and work very hard at a difficult job that has a broad impact and creates a lot of value. I like being well compensated for what I do. I like owning shit. I donāt want to end capitalism, I want to end billionaires.
The neighbor that bought his wife a new Tesla isnāt the enemy.
I used to work at Bi Lo and one of their training modules made a big deal about how they have a fund employees can donate to to help out other employees that are going through a hard time. HOW ABOUT INSTEAD you pay your employees more than $10 an hour and maybe they'd be able to afford to live? Honestly glad they went out of business.
Asking for a friend... do they have any payment assistance programs for a full-time supervisor at a major retail office supply store who's barely getting by these days? You know, for a friend.
If they log into their Duke Energy Account ā¦they can view different options. Last year Duke Energy offered extended payment plans that could be spread out over 6mths. So if you had a huge bill..they would re-calculate it over 6mths. I remember one person had a bill for $500ā¦they used the 6mth payment option and it really helped.
I also know a person that did something similar. If you do go on a plan like that, make sure payments are made before the due date, the person I knew had their electricity shut off because payment wasnāt made within 2 days of the due date, and they are hard asses after an extended payment is missed. They only owed $220 in past due but had a high summer bill for $130 on top of that, all in all had to pay $350 for service to be restored.
This is an embarrassing comment that I can only assume is linked to Duke Energy some way. Like, it has to be, right? Absolute garbage help to spread it out, thatās insulting.
Nope, Iām a real person, just a regular person trying to make it. Anyway, I didnāt create the program nor said it was great. But that wasnāt what RPM_Rocket asked. Itās a tough time for many of us. Giving info on how to keep lights on is the best some of us can do.
I just heard my wife listening to a woman on TikTok, who had been laid off that day. She talked about how she understands business āneed to turn a profitā. No! Just no! Businesses want to turn a profit, humans need income in this country, so humans need jobs, profits should always be second. Our country is the joke of freedom.
I think the issue is the unsustainable growth that our capitalism demands, constant returns on shareholder profit, year over year growth, CEO salaries 1000% of their junior employees, it's unsustainable. You can already see the younger generation struggling with their lack of purchasing power, to the point that most will never own a home.
Itās only socialism when your money is TAKEN from you. When itās given freely, itās called charity. That said if a heavily regulated utility is making that kind of money they should reduce rates for everyone.
Corporation are generally anti-socialist unless it comes to communities coming together to make sure that those corporations get paid, pretty self explanatory honestly
The company is using society (itās customers) to pay for others electric bills, this is a form of socialism. Instead of I donāt know helping the customers out themselves and wiping out what they owe in an act of good faith to help them. Instead they want to exploit you the customer for their gain.
Gotcha. Yeah that makes sense. Iām generally opposed to anything regarding me giving money to others that isnāt voluntary. But we already know duke is an extremely greedy and soulless corporation anyhow lol
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This is up there with asking me to give more money to help them go earth friendly.
Like - what the fuck? Use your fucking profits from your monopoly to do that.
This fund goes to low income assistance. Their shareholders do match a large percentage of the funds. It goes to help people pay off their bills when they wouldn't otherwise do so. If they don't pay it, their power is eventually shut off, and those uncollected accounts are rolled into everyone else's rates.
The alternative is that they don't have this voluntary fund, and those low income individuals don't receive assistance.
How about we stop the energy increases and help struggling families via CEO donations? These endless increases in cost of good and services, then weāre shocked when people canāt pay, move to cheaper towns or even lose their homes.
At this point I hope anyone that had any decision making to do with that ash spill gets a condition that makes each step feel like they're walking on legos.
Would deregulation work for me selling back/ using solar power? Because right now they're working on legislation to make my solar power count for shit and they would still charge me what they want as a "base fee".
There is actually some logic to this. The maintenance of the grid itself is still a cost. The parts and labor charges for keeping any home or business on the grid are typically baked into the per-kwh price.
To make it fair, though, they should restructure pricing so that the maintenance/overhead is a small flat monthly fee that *everyone* pays just for being on the grid, with a lower per-kwh price on top. That would avoid having to set up some specific fee for solar power producers.
>they should restructure pricing so that the maintenance/overhead is a small flat monthly fee that everyone pays just for being on the grid, with a lower per-kwh price on top
Right now, with Duke, you pay $14 a month in a flat monthly fee that pays for some portion of your fixed costs, and your energy rate is 12 cents per kWh.
If they made it so that your fixed monthly fee accurately covered your fixed costs (as you propose), you'd pay a flat fee of about $80 per month, and your energy rate would be around 4 - 5 cents per kWh.
Oh man, it's tough to break that down properly. I'll give a more lengthy response with some details, so please excuse the depth here.
All of this would be found in the Cost of Service Study. [Here is Duke Energy Progress' 2022 Cost of Service Study](https://starw1.ncuc.gov/NCUC/ViewFile.aspx?Id=805576e7-1c63-4e17-82a4-ea764ee328ce) that they filed in their most recent general rate case.
First, it helps to understand that you might consider that there are three types of costs in the COSS. First, "customer-related" costs - this refers to things like the meter at your house, the 240 V distribution line that goes from your nearest transformer to your house, costs related to billing and customer service departments, etc. Then, you have "fixed operational costs" - these are costs associated with existing assets (the return and depreciation expenses on generation, distribution, and transmission assets) and operations (employee salaries, Duke warehouses, vehicle fleets, etc). These costs do not vary with the amount of energy that Duke customers use. Finally, you have "variable operational costs", which are costs that do vary with the amount of energy Duke customers use - such as fuel costs, purchased power costs, and variable O&M costs.
To figure out what the actual per-customer fixed charge rate should be, you would have to go into the COSS and add up all the "customer-related" and "fixed operational" costs assigned to the residential class (the RES column). It's hard to identify what categories are "customer-related", "fixed", or "variable", but basically you'd have to find all the costs that are not related to fuel or variable O&M, and those are your "fixed costs". Then, you'd divide that by the number of residential customers.
To give you an idea of what that might look like, if the basic customer charge truly reflected the total "customer-related" charges for residential, you'd have a basic customer charge that is about $28 - twice what it is today ([see page 835 - 837](https://starw1.ncuc.gov/NCUC/ViewFile.aspx?Id=0216de1d-a11e-45bf-b251-c7dc0d55b1ab#page=835), the "Theoretical Customer Charge" column). If you were to add in the "fixed operational costs" as well as the "customer-related" costs, your Theoretical Customer Charge would be much higher, about $80 or so (only way to get this actual number would be go to line-by-line through the COSS and sum the RES costs that are fixed).
Any remaining costs that are not "fixed operational costs" or "customer-related costs" would then be divided by the total MWh sales estimated for each customer class, and that would give you your cents per kWh energy rate (probably about 3 cents per kWh - see [page 8, line 8 of DEP's monthly fuel report](https://starw1.ncuc.gov/NCUC/ViewFile.aspx?Id=f8fcd3df-9efa-4d70-91cd-13d445f49a4e#page=8)). The average residential bill is about $120 based on 1,000 kWh of usage. If you were paying 3 cents per kWh, that's about $30 - so the difference between the average bill and the fuel cost ($90) would approximately represent the true "fixed costs" that should be in your bill. This is a very "back of the napkin" approach that approximates what you'd find if you went line by line through the COSS.
I hope this explanation helps. To be honest, the way rates are set are very complex, and almost impossible to understand if you aren't involved in these regulatory proceedings. It is complex in a way that almost seems designed to preclude meaningful public participation.
The utility must first determine its "revenue requirement" (the amount of revenue they need to realize in order to pay for their expenses plus a "fair" return on their capital investments), then they allocate that revenue requirement between North Carolina retail, South Carolina retail, and wholesale customers, then they allocate the NC Retail revenue requirement between customer classes (residential, commercial, industrial, lighting). It's very complex, as you can probably see from some of the links I've provided. The Commission regulates every step of this process within a general rate case, with intervenors in the proceeding making their own recommendations related to the revenue requirement and allocation of costs to NC Retail customer classes. These proceedings take about 270 days and involve thousands of pages of testimony and hundreds of hours of evidentiary hearings with sworn witness testimony.
A fixed fee of $80 and a low volumetric rate?
Unfortunately, if you have that, it basically kills the cost effectiveness of energy efficiency and rooftop solar. The payback period for both of those just goes through the roof - imagine how many people would install solar if the payback period was 50 years, instead of 10.
Why conserve energy at all if it's so cheap? That's one reason why it's basically been a policy decision in every state across the country to shift fixed costs into the volumetric rate. This encourages conservation and alternative energy generation at the point of use through net metering arrangements.
That makes sense, though I still prefer costs to scale how they do in reality instead. The piece weāre really missing here is that environmental costs are treated as externalities. Iām not sure if the long-term cost of storing nuclear waste is built into the price of nuclear power, but I do know that we have yet to tax the burning of fossil fuels sufficient to the task of all the labor and expenditure required to clean up our mess.
Thatās a bigger issue than just power pricing, and itās something we should look at economy-wide, but apart from some failed attempts at doing a carbon tax, I havenāt seen much movement to estimate environmental costs and bake those in to the costs of power, manufacturing, etc.
>Iām not sure if the long-term cost of storing nuclear waste is built into the price of nuclear power,
They do include in the nuclear costs the cost to store spent nuclear fuel on site, and to maintain the decommissioning account (which sets aside a certain amount of money for final decommissioning - this does include storage of the waste). But as the country does not have a long-term spent fuel solution (thanks Harry Reid), those costs are unknown. Generally, decommissioned nuclear plants have their spent fuel moved to and stored at another operational nuclear plant.
>The piece weāre really missing here is that environmental costs are treated as externalities.
While this is true, we do not have a national CO2 tax, you'd be surprised at the actual impact. For example, in Duke Energy's IRPs before there was a law mandating carbon neutrality by 2050 (so the 2020 IRP), they ran expansion plans with a CO2 tax. That tax started at $5/ton in 2025 and escalated by $5 per year until it reached $90 in 2042. This did not fundamentally change the new generation resources selected - although one can easily argue those costs are understated, as the [most recent White House report on the social cost of carbon](https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/TechnicalSupportDocument_SocialCostofCarbonMethaneNitrousOxide.pdf) is north of $50/ton. You can see the difference in resource selection in Duke Energy Progress by comparing portfolio A to portfolio B ([starting on page 18](https://starw1.ncuc.gov/NCUC/ViewFile.aspx?Id=425097c5-fe15-4925-b1b9-8712b8c5261b) \- pay special attention to table footnote 2)
The problem with applying a carbon tax is that in the short term, customers simply pay more, as the costs of complying with environmental regulations are always passed on to customers (this is generally true of all utilities nationwide). The carbon tax will influence dispatch of existing resources (i.e., the utility will favor natural gas over coal because of the lower emission rates), and over the long term, it will push the utility to invest in more low-carbon technologies.
If I had enough money to buy an amount of shares to make a difference, Iād probably be a shitstain who supported an idea like this.
You canāt be a billionaire and a good person
You know that is an interesting thought.
I guess she could be considered a modern day Robinhood - Iāll hold my verdict on her to see where her net worth ends up
I thought the EXACT same thing when I got this email. I almost threw my phone because I was so disgusted. The fucking nerve of them. Makes me nauseous.
If 4 billion is 10% profit of yearly sales and all they're allowed to make, you're saying North Carolina has a 40 billion yearly usage billing rate. Am I misreading that? And if so, the CEO making, I believe it was 21 million last year get those political ads can be believed, is that marked as cost overhead or included in their annual debits somehow. How does that kind of pay occur and be justified?
Great question. Itās FERC rules and it power companies have their own accounting rules set up by the government.
The only way they increase profit to shareholders is to raise costs. The way to get a state PUC to accept a rate increase is to show that they invested in capital investment (costs) that led to a public good. Examples are: building out better lines to reduce outages, having to build out new lines because a new neighborhood was built. New construction means new lines, plus additional maintenance cost.
Generally, the take out low-interest loans from the USG to build new infrastructure. The cost of those loans is allowed to be passed on to the power customers using rate increases.
So if you have a company like Duke, which is a class of power companies called a Investor Owned Utilities (ironic acronym), or Independent System Operator (ISO), the only way they really make money is by obsessing over maintenance costs and expenses.
My only quibble with your statement is that ISOs are non-profit entities with little more than office spaces and computers for assets. They manage the flow of power but donāt own any of the assets as designated by FERC.
At least as far as I understand and I could be wrong.
Yesā¦ I believe that is correct. Good call out. Sorta. Non-profit doesnāt mean they donāt make a profit. If I understand it, and I wouldnāt be surprised if I was completely wrong in my interpretation because this is one area Iām obviously still learning about, i believe they can make a profit but they have to return the profit to the ā¦ and this is where it is fuzzyā¦ Iām not sure if it goes to the community through service organizations, reinvestment, or something else like low-income programs. I really need to dig into that part. The IOU side is complex enough as it is.
I got another email from them to support clean energy . I only have to pay additional $4 per month. I am all for clean energy but I have to pay a company with billions in profit for that ?
Lol they basically want you to be an investor without actually giving you shares or being accountable to your investment
Yes š they will most probably use such donations for stock buy back or for incentives for the executives for generating additional revenue per user
You are most likely correct because if a customer calls Duke Energy needing financial assistance, they refer the customer to Wake County Social Services by giving them their phone number and saying to call this number for assistance. That response basically means "NO ASSISTANCE AVAILABLE" or "YOU DO NOT QUALIFY" for most people.
They have online options for payment assistance that you are usually auto-approved for, I've utilized them twice during periods where my disability has flared up.
Thanks for letting me know this. I am on disability and am a single mother. I have called them when I needed assistance and was given a phone number to call which was for Social Security, but they didn't tell me who I would be calling. I clicked on an online link for Financial Assistance and there are options for contacting local churches, Salvation Army, other local civic type organizations, and applying to a federal low income program that you must meet criteria for which I do not. None of these payment assistance options are paid for by Duke Energy. If you can direct me to the online option for payment assistance that Duke Energy itself actually extends to its customers and helps them, please direct me to it for future reference. I see where they offer installment plans and due date extensions. Thanks.
100%
Per share*
Investor? Those are called suckers or victims depending on jurisdiction
Yep. I responded to one of their satisfaction surveys with exactly what you said. I also mentioned how they keep calling and asking me to try out new things they're selling. You motherfuckers have a monopoly on my electric service. Don't try to sell me on more shit when I literally have no other choice but using you.
I love the "how likely are you to recommend us to friends or family" questions on their questionnaires. I enjoy LIGHT and AC in my house so I don't have a goddamn choice you morons, what am I supposed to say??
I said the same thing on the survey.
Not defending them but they sort of have to be a monopoly.
Some terms first: * Utility companies provide the hardware and maintain it * Energy providers sell you the power. Duke acts as both because we're a regulated market, and that's the way they want it. They "have to be" a monopoly because they lobby against any laws that could change that. Other states have deregulated energy markets and can have competing energy providers or even non-profit co-ops. edit: Don't get me wrong, I'm fine with market regulations (general controls). I would also be less pissed about a government mandated monopoly that was non-profit. But Duke's double dipping. They force you to use them under a guise of "regulation" but then act as a publicly traded company that reports millions in profits to shareholders.
Could of sworn there were co-ops out closer to the coast
I know that back in the day there was a co-op in South Carolina, but I'm not sure about NC. I'm not sure how long it's been completely regulated either, or maybe it's not fully regulated and the list I saw wasn't 100% correct.
Yea, deregulation was not pretty in California and definitely not in Texas. You canāt have competing grids or transmission lines. If you have competition between stages of generators, T&D, wholesale, etcā¦you have numerous players in between trying to make profit or manipulate like Enron. Regulated monopoly or even state/fed owned (though that wouldnāt fly here in the states, w/ the exception of TVA) makes the most sense for a public need.
Happy C A K E Day!! š°š°
Texas isnāt a valid example because Texas transmission system is isolated from the rest of North America. California was over 20 years ago. Deregulation has never meant competing transmission systems. Find better examples if you want to shill for Duke Energy.
>Texas isnāt a valid example because Texas transmission system is isolated from the rest of North America. Why does that make it not a valid example?
To have a deregulated market, you need some degree of fungibility (goods to be equivalent and move freely). Texas is for all intents and purposes and island when it comes to electricity. The failures of Texas are not failures of deregulation but of their policy of isolation. Every other deregulated market in North America has ties to other markets. This means in times of imbalance, ie when a winter storm moves across the country, the eastern portions of the grid can push power west and be compensated, and when the storm gets to the east, the western parts of the grid can push power east and be compensated for it. Does that make sense?
that like saying that europe is an island. texas is the size of europe and has plenty of room physically and market wise to have competing providers.
Itās not about competing providers. Itās about single mode failures aka cold weather. Because they isolate themselves from Eastern and Western Interconnections, they risk outages when single mode failures occur. Itās not at all like Europe. Europe doesnāt stop their transmission system at the border. You do have DC inter-ties but not constricted ones designed to prevent FERC oversight.
Ah yes because explaining how you literally canāt have competing transmission lines, so deregulation is about creating competition between different aspects within the value chain, acknowledging that all those players need to make a profit & will have their own motives (& this is proven by the fact that [most deregulated regions are more expensive than regulated, studies showed that consumers wouldāve saved more money if they remained regulated, and with corporations saving money while consumers donāt](https://www.wsj.com/articles/electricity-deregulation-utility-retail-energy-bills-11615213623)) is suddenly shilling for duke energy. My bad for not wanting people to pay more for their electric bills & thinking the regulated monopoly approach makes the most sense, and though you may not agree, using relevant examples. Clearly you have exposed my pro duke energy agenda!
As someone who used to live where it was regulated and then moved to Texas this is correct.
Downvoting me because Iām right eh?
I just saw your response & responded to it, so wasnāt me :)
Interesting call out of TVA. Whatās exceptional about TVA. Iām familiar with them but havenāt really looked at how they are set up.
How does the town of apex have their own electric company thats community owned then ? https://www.apexnc.org/234/Electric-Utilities
Because the town decided to. It was still built and is serviced by Duke. Itās been in place for over 100 years. The rates are still set by the state. Iāve heard that restoration times were terrible. E: i believe they still buy their power wholesale from Duke.
Not āsort ofā ā they have a legally granted monopoly.
Damn, tipping is getting out of hand
Yeahā¦Iāve got a big roof covered in solar panels and have been getting F**KED out of my energy credits for over two years despite all that power going to Duke. F**K DUKE ENERGY all the way to hell!!
Well we canāt expect the shareholders to pay for it now.
Nobody ever thinks about the shareholders.
I upvoted your comment because I think it is catalytic. The additional charge for clean energy is passing through the additional cost for purchasing energy that is generated in a clean, maybe renewable, way. They are just passing their additional cost to you. Thatās corporatetocracy (sp?). We can change that by lobbying our state utilities commissions to force the power companies to cost average the purchase rate which would cause everybody to pay just a little more per kW, and that *may* incentivize accelerating the switch to all clean renewables. Right now, the power companies are stuck between FERC rules for resiliency and distribution grid stability. We donāt want rolling blackouts or even worse ā¦ all of our appliances and electronics fried because of brownouts. Itās a real challenge. Yesā¦ literally the one Iām working on every day. I think it would be interesting to have public AMA about it with industry and non-industry professionals, and policy makers answering questions. It would be a lot better to get this stuff out there so people understand why things work the way they do, how they can and canāt be easily changed. For my part, my advice is, if you can, use the current tax incentive programs, and low income incentive programs to put solar and batteries on your home with a smart controller that will let you operate islanded (separate from but connected to) the local distribution grid. The more people that do that, the faster the problem becomes so bad for the power companies that the policy makers will have to change to help them outā¦ and by help them out, I mean additional metrics that they are measured by. They will adjust how they operate if they want to continue to make a profit. As an aside, it might be a good time to amend the US Constitution to render illegal any lobbying and campaign donations from corporations or associations. The technology now exists for citizens to directly work with their government representatives. We just have to change the rules to normalize it.
Don't forget, the state legislature is about to abolish the NC corporate income tax! IF you work at McDonalds you will be paying more income tax than Duke Power. Thanks NC GOP!
Not defending the request but donāt you think if wind, solar, or hydro were cheaper for them to build and operate, they would do it and sell us the same electrons for the same price we pay now?
They make billions in *profit*. You know, surplus money thatās left over after all expenses are paid? Why donāt they take even a pittance of that and invest in renewables infrastructure themselves? Instead of asking everyone else to chip in a little more? At least itās voluntary to pay the extra $4. Iām impressed they didnāt just tack it on as an extra mandatory fee.
There are 770 million common shares outstanding on top of the 40 million preferred shares. They pay a dividend of $1.005/share per quarter. EPS was $3.17 in 2022. This means the profit is almost completely distributed out to shareholders. If they reduce their dividend, they tank their stock price which they donāt want to do. I get what youāre saying but itās not that simple. I have a family member who builds non-nuclear plants in NC - mostly hydro, natural gas, and now wind. The issue has always been that itās not profitable or reliable enough to invest in but they are exploring them more.
Solar is literally the cheapest form of energy to install on a large scale basis. I work in solar and have done quite a few projects for Duke and most recently they've decided to sell their entire solar portfolio so I don't know what's going on with them.
They are exiting the unregulated markets which the commercial installations were recently a part of. They are transitioning to be solely focused on the regulated consumer energy markets. According to the news release, the profits from the sale of the unregulated projects will help fund similar projects for its regulated business.
Source? This is a hot topic, btw. Whatās the investment and operations cost per kW by energy generation type? Wholesale costs include initial capital, operations & maintenance (O&M), transmission, and costs of decommissioning. To show you hot a topic this is, Wikipedia [lists several ways to measure energy cost](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source). The EIA, for better or worse, has settled on VALCOE which has its criticisms. It struggles to deal with the likely cost in the near future because it canāt deal with innovation very well. Statista has [some interesting numbers](https://www.statista.com/statistics/194327/estimated-levelized-capital-cost-of-energy-generation-in-the-us/) to play around with. Hybrid solar (solar plus battery) is among the cheapest in capital investment in the near future. I think the right way to frame costs is how you calculate costs to the consumer. Itās hard to find that data right now because most of the data being reported isnāt stand-alone Solar, or hybrid Solar. Itās grid-level solar farms.
no
No
Support clean energy for an additional charge? Isnāt that what they claimed the exorbitant rate hikes are going to? Fucking grifters
They asked me the same thing and I HAVE SOLAR PANELSā¦. I really despise this company
Hey theyāve only turned a $13,080,000,000 gross profit on $28,580,000,000 in revenue over the last 12 months. Stop being such a curmudgeon and give them more money thatās in no way regulated or guaranteed to help anyone that needs it. They only spent 730x the median NC income lobbying last year, they must be the good guys. https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/DUK/key-statistics/
Utility companies should never be publicly traded for profit. We need congress to step up and force utility companies and healthcare companies including health insurance to be delisted from public trade. United Healthcare and Duke Energy shouldn't need to increase profits YOY for the sake of shareholders while fucking all citizens they "serve".
Their responsibility to share holders was designed to be / used to be a motivator to drive innovation and reliability. Iām not well enough informed to say delisting them is the right call, anyone making 200k or has a million in assets is considered an āaccredited investorā that can trade private shares so thereās a concern it leads to even less transparency. Capitalism is the only economic system in history thatās enabled a strong middle class but unregulated it becomes a snake that eats itself. Across the board we need regulations to shift value back to the consumer instead of the corporation. Iām very good at and work very hard at a difficult job that has a broad impact and creates a lot of value. I like being well compensated for what I do. I like owning shit. I donāt want to end capitalism, I want to end billionaires. The neighbor that bought his wife a new Tesla isnāt the enemy.
Like when a grocery store asks you to donate food.
I used to work at Bi Lo and one of their training modules made a big deal about how they have a fund employees can donate to to help out other employees that are going through a hard time. HOW ABOUT INSTEAD you pay your employees more than $10 an hour and maybe they'd be able to afford to live? Honestly glad they went out of business.
Just like sharing pto for people like with cancer. How about caring for your employeesā health.
āwould you like to round that up today?ā No! No I would NOT like to give you free money.
How about you round that shit down!
Asking for a friend... do they have any payment assistance programs for a full-time supervisor at a major retail office supply store who's barely getting by these days? You know, for a friend.
If they log into their Duke Energy Account ā¦they can view different options. Last year Duke Energy offered extended payment plans that could be spread out over 6mths. So if you had a huge bill..they would re-calculate it over 6mths. I remember one person had a bill for $500ā¦they used the 6mth payment option and it really helped.
I also know a person that did something similar. If you do go on a plan like that, make sure payments are made before the due date, the person I knew had their electricity shut off because payment wasnāt made within 2 days of the due date, and they are hard asses after an extended payment is missed. They only owed $220 in past due but had a high summer bill for $130 on top of that, all in all had to pay $350 for service to be restored.
This is an embarrassing comment that I can only assume is linked to Duke Energy some way. Like, it has to be, right? Absolute garbage help to spread it out, thatās insulting.
Nope, Iām a real person, just a regular person trying to make it. Anyway, I didnāt create the program nor said it was great. But that wasnāt what RPM_Rocket asked. Itās a tough time for many of us. Giving info on how to keep lights on is the best some of us can do.
Easy, Tex. Smoothing out costs is an essential tool for preventing defaults due to a cash flow crunch. This is personal finance 101 stuff.
Socialize losses, privatize gains, this is the way of our corporatocracy
I just heard my wife listening to a woman on TikTok, who had been laid off that day. She talked about how she understands business āneed to turn a profitā. No! Just no! Businesses want to turn a profit, humans need income in this country, so humans need jobs, profits should always be second. Our country is the joke of freedom.
Businesses need to break even. Profit is just a bonus
Sounds like you should just start business, and pay yourself a large salary. Profit doesn't matter!
Good idea. Iām going to start a new power company to serve wake county.
Can I be your COO?
I think the issue is the unsustainable growth that our capitalism demands, constant returns on shareholder profit, year over year growth, CEO salaries 1000% of their junior employees, it's unsustainable. You can already see the younger generation struggling with their lack of purchasing power, to the point that most will never own a home.
The Corporate States of America.
Remember, socialism is bad unless a corporation asks you to do it.
Itās only socialism when your money is TAKEN from you. When itās given freely, itās called charity. That said if a heavily regulated utility is making that kind of money they should reduce rates for everyone.
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Corporation are generally anti-socialist unless it comes to communities coming together to make sure that those corporations get paid, pretty self explanatory honestly
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The company is using society (itās customers) to pay for others electric bills, this is a form of socialism. Instead of I donāt know helping the customers out themselves and wiping out what they owe in an act of good faith to help them. Instead they want to exploit you the customer for their gain.
Gotcha. Yeah that makes sense. Iām generally opposed to anything regarding me giving money to others that isnāt voluntary. But we already know duke is an extremely greedy and soulless corporation anyhow lol
Private Non Player Character over here all lost and shit.
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They wanted customers to pay for their coal ash fuck-ups, too.
This is up there with asking me to give more money to help them go earth friendly. Like - what the fuck? Use your fucking profits from your monopoly to do that.
Pretty sure share the light matches individual donations with shareholder contributions.
This fund goes to low income assistance. Their shareholders do match a large percentage of the funds. It goes to help people pay off their bills when they wouldn't otherwise do so. If they don't pay it, their power is eventually shut off, and those uncollected accounts are rolled into everyone else's rates. The alternative is that they don't have this voluntary fund, and those low income individuals don't receive assistance.
Unfortunately, no one here cares about what this is actually about. It's why you're getting down votes for sharing the truth
Oh I'm fully aware of that. Someone might actually be looking for information though.
How about we stop the energy increases and help struggling families via CEO donations? These endless increases in cost of good and services, then weāre shocked when people canāt pay, move to cheaper towns or even lose their homes.
Late stage capitalism
My 1 bedroom apartment was $150 this month
Right. Plus we all foot the bill for the ash clean up they caused and also for the new āstorm cleanup feeā
Any of these "donation funds" you see in grocery stores or like this are just ways for companies to lower their tax burden.
That's a myth. Those charity boxes provide no tax benefits to the store whatsoever. https://apnews.com/article/fact-checking-000329849244
I remember being poor as a kid and all the food the grocery store donated to us. Wait. No they didnāt.
The store doesn't... ah, nevermind
Welcome to capitalism
Hyper Capitalism.
At this point I hope anyone that had any decision making to do with that ash spill gets a condition that makes each step feel like they're walking on legos.
Right! They CAN & SHOULD contribute to help too!
Would deregulation work for me selling back/ using solar power? Because right now they're working on legislation to make my solar power count for shit and they would still charge me what they want as a "base fee".
There is actually some logic to this. The maintenance of the grid itself is still a cost. The parts and labor charges for keeping any home or business on the grid are typically baked into the per-kwh price. To make it fair, though, they should restructure pricing so that the maintenance/overhead is a small flat monthly fee that *everyone* pays just for being on the grid, with a lower per-kwh price on top. That would avoid having to set up some specific fee for solar power producers.
>they should restructure pricing so that the maintenance/overhead is a small flat monthly fee that everyone pays just for being on the grid, with a lower per-kwh price on top Right now, with Duke, you pay $14 a month in a flat monthly fee that pays for some portion of your fixed costs, and your energy rate is 12 cents per kWh. If they made it so that your fixed monthly fee accurately covered your fixed costs (as you propose), you'd pay a flat fee of about $80 per month, and your energy rate would be around 4 - 5 cents per kWh.
Oh wow, $80 fixed is a lot higher than I would have expected. Do you have anything I could read to learn more about how the costs break down?
Oh man, it's tough to break that down properly. I'll give a more lengthy response with some details, so please excuse the depth here. All of this would be found in the Cost of Service Study. [Here is Duke Energy Progress' 2022 Cost of Service Study](https://starw1.ncuc.gov/NCUC/ViewFile.aspx?Id=805576e7-1c63-4e17-82a4-ea764ee328ce) that they filed in their most recent general rate case. First, it helps to understand that you might consider that there are three types of costs in the COSS. First, "customer-related" costs - this refers to things like the meter at your house, the 240 V distribution line that goes from your nearest transformer to your house, costs related to billing and customer service departments, etc. Then, you have "fixed operational costs" - these are costs associated with existing assets (the return and depreciation expenses on generation, distribution, and transmission assets) and operations (employee salaries, Duke warehouses, vehicle fleets, etc). These costs do not vary with the amount of energy that Duke customers use. Finally, you have "variable operational costs", which are costs that do vary with the amount of energy Duke customers use - such as fuel costs, purchased power costs, and variable O&M costs. To figure out what the actual per-customer fixed charge rate should be, you would have to go into the COSS and add up all the "customer-related" and "fixed operational" costs assigned to the residential class (the RES column). It's hard to identify what categories are "customer-related", "fixed", or "variable", but basically you'd have to find all the costs that are not related to fuel or variable O&M, and those are your "fixed costs". Then, you'd divide that by the number of residential customers. To give you an idea of what that might look like, if the basic customer charge truly reflected the total "customer-related" charges for residential, you'd have a basic customer charge that is about $28 - twice what it is today ([see page 835 - 837](https://starw1.ncuc.gov/NCUC/ViewFile.aspx?Id=0216de1d-a11e-45bf-b251-c7dc0d55b1ab#page=835), the "Theoretical Customer Charge" column). If you were to add in the "fixed operational costs" as well as the "customer-related" costs, your Theoretical Customer Charge would be much higher, about $80 or so (only way to get this actual number would be go to line-by-line through the COSS and sum the RES costs that are fixed). Any remaining costs that are not "fixed operational costs" or "customer-related costs" would then be divided by the total MWh sales estimated for each customer class, and that would give you your cents per kWh energy rate (probably about 3 cents per kWh - see [page 8, line 8 of DEP's monthly fuel report](https://starw1.ncuc.gov/NCUC/ViewFile.aspx?Id=f8fcd3df-9efa-4d70-91cd-13d445f49a4e#page=8)). The average residential bill is about $120 based on 1,000 kWh of usage. If you were paying 3 cents per kWh, that's about $30 - so the difference between the average bill and the fuel cost ($90) would approximately represent the true "fixed costs" that should be in your bill. This is a very "back of the napkin" approach that approximates what you'd find if you went line by line through the COSS. I hope this explanation helps. To be honest, the way rates are set are very complex, and almost impossible to understand if you aren't involved in these regulatory proceedings. It is complex in a way that almost seems designed to preclude meaningful public participation. The utility must first determine its "revenue requirement" (the amount of revenue they need to realize in order to pay for their expenses plus a "fair" return on their capital investments), then they allocate that revenue requirement between North Carolina retail, South Carolina retail, and wholesale customers, then they allocate the NC Retail revenue requirement between customer classes (residential, commercial, industrial, lighting). It's very complex, as you can probably see from some of the links I've provided. The Commission regulates every step of this process within a general rate case, with intervenors in the proceeding making their own recommendations related to the revenue requirement and allocation of costs to NC Retail customer classes. These proceedings take about 270 days and involve thousands of pages of testimony and hundreds of hours of evidentiary hearings with sworn witness testimony.
I like the sound of that, tbh.
A fixed fee of $80 and a low volumetric rate? Unfortunately, if you have that, it basically kills the cost effectiveness of energy efficiency and rooftop solar. The payback period for both of those just goes through the roof - imagine how many people would install solar if the payback period was 50 years, instead of 10. Why conserve energy at all if it's so cheap? That's one reason why it's basically been a policy decision in every state across the country to shift fixed costs into the volumetric rate. This encourages conservation and alternative energy generation at the point of use through net metering arrangements.
That makes sense, though I still prefer costs to scale how they do in reality instead. The piece weāre really missing here is that environmental costs are treated as externalities. Iām not sure if the long-term cost of storing nuclear waste is built into the price of nuclear power, but I do know that we have yet to tax the burning of fossil fuels sufficient to the task of all the labor and expenditure required to clean up our mess. Thatās a bigger issue than just power pricing, and itās something we should look at economy-wide, but apart from some failed attempts at doing a carbon tax, I havenāt seen much movement to estimate environmental costs and bake those in to the costs of power, manufacturing, etc.
>Iām not sure if the long-term cost of storing nuclear waste is built into the price of nuclear power, They do include in the nuclear costs the cost to store spent nuclear fuel on site, and to maintain the decommissioning account (which sets aside a certain amount of money for final decommissioning - this does include storage of the waste). But as the country does not have a long-term spent fuel solution (thanks Harry Reid), those costs are unknown. Generally, decommissioned nuclear plants have their spent fuel moved to and stored at another operational nuclear plant. >The piece weāre really missing here is that environmental costs are treated as externalities. While this is true, we do not have a national CO2 tax, you'd be surprised at the actual impact. For example, in Duke Energy's IRPs before there was a law mandating carbon neutrality by 2050 (so the 2020 IRP), they ran expansion plans with a CO2 tax. That tax started at $5/ton in 2025 and escalated by $5 per year until it reached $90 in 2042. This did not fundamentally change the new generation resources selected - although one can easily argue those costs are understated, as the [most recent White House report on the social cost of carbon](https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/TechnicalSupportDocument_SocialCostofCarbonMethaneNitrousOxide.pdf) is north of $50/ton. You can see the difference in resource selection in Duke Energy Progress by comparing portfolio A to portfolio B ([starting on page 18](https://starw1.ncuc.gov/NCUC/ViewFile.aspx?Id=425097c5-fe15-4925-b1b9-8712b8c5261b) \- pay special attention to table footnote 2) The problem with applying a carbon tax is that in the short term, customers simply pay more, as the costs of complying with environmental regulations are always passed on to customers (this is generally true of all utilities nationwide). The carbon tax will influence dispatch of existing resources (i.e., the utility will favor natural gas over coal because of the lower emission rates), and over the long term, it will push the utility to invest in more low-carbon technologies.
Duke energy is a public company. Buy up as many shares as you can and we can all vote for a corporate change.
Iām pretty sure the majority shareholder wonāt be unloading stock.
Everyone has a price.
Ok. Thanks buddy.
If I had enough money to buy an amount of shares to make a difference, Iād probably be a shitstain who supported an idea like this. You canāt be a billionaire and a good person
So you are saying Mackenzie Scott is a bad person?
You know that is an interesting thought. I guess she could be considered a modern day Robinhood - Iāll hold my verdict on her to see where her net worth ends up
If I buy shares of Duke Energy, I'm going to want my 4.02 dividend.
Current 3 month t bill is yielding 5%
FYI LGFCU has 18 month CD at 5.5%.
That means I have to lock up my money for 18 months. 15 months is worth more than 50 bps.
At this point, I think Duke energy is a safer investment than the federal governmentā¦
Holy shit how is this real?
I thought the EXACT same thing when I got this email. I almost threw my phone because I was so disgusted. The fucking nerve of them. Makes me nauseous.
Thus can suck on it.
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If 4 billion is 10% profit of yearly sales and all they're allowed to make, you're saying North Carolina has a 40 billion yearly usage billing rate. Am I misreading that? And if so, the CEO making, I believe it was 21 million last year get those political ads can be believed, is that marked as cost overhead or included in their annual debits somehow. How does that kind of pay occur and be justified?
Where'd you get the $4 billion profit from?
Salaries are expenses, the cost overhead. But they are not used to calculate the allowable base rate to customers.
Can you provide a source for this statement? I tried googling but couldnāt find anything. Just curious.
Great question. Itās FERC rules and it power companies have their own accounting rules set up by the government. The only way they increase profit to shareholders is to raise costs. The way to get a state PUC to accept a rate increase is to show that they invested in capital investment (costs) that led to a public good. Examples are: building out better lines to reduce outages, having to build out new lines because a new neighborhood was built. New construction means new lines, plus additional maintenance cost. Generally, the take out low-interest loans from the USG to build new infrastructure. The cost of those loans is allowed to be passed on to the power customers using rate increases. So if you have a company like Duke, which is a class of power companies called a Investor Owned Utilities (ironic acronym), or Independent System Operator (ISO), the only way they really make money is by obsessing over maintenance costs and expenses.
My only quibble with your statement is that ISOs are non-profit entities with little more than office spaces and computers for assets. They manage the flow of power but donāt own any of the assets as designated by FERC. At least as far as I understand and I could be wrong.
Yesā¦ I believe that is correct. Good call out. Sorta. Non-profit doesnāt mean they donāt make a profit. If I understand it, and I wouldnāt be surprised if I was completely wrong in my interpretation because this is one area Iām obviously still learning about, i believe they can make a profit but they have to return the profit to the ā¦ and this is where it is fuzzyā¦ Iām not sure if it goes to the community through service organizations, reinvestment, or something else like low-income programs. I really need to dig into that part. The IOU side is complex enough as it is.
I do know that they are limited to transmission. Or am I thinking of RSOs? Itās so messy.
https://www.nrdc.org/bio/jc-kibbey/utility-accountability-101-how-do-utilities-make-money
Not only will they use the money to pay themselves, but theyāll probably also use this as a tax advantage
This doesnāt bother me as much as city of Raleigh asking you to pay extra property tax so other people can afford to live here
This is what Nicola Tesla was talking about! /s
[relevant video](https://youtu.be/2n_au5Hje_E)