Tag: power bill

Another rate increase may be coming to Duke Energy customers if its new proposal is approved.

The company filed revised rate requests with the North Carolina Utilities Commission Thursday for both Duke Energy Carolinas and Duke Energy Progress customers. Duke Energy Carolinas covers the western half of the state, including Charlotte. Progress operates in the eastern half, including the Triangle region. Both companies serve parts of South Carolina.

Both groups of customers would experience about a 15% increase between 2027 and 2028. If approved, the customer increases would go into effect Jan. 1, 2027, with a second increase the following year.

For Duke Energy Carolinas customers, the monthly bill would increase by $17.22 in 2027 and again by $6.34 in 2028. In the first year, that would take average bills from $144.98 to $162.20.

For Duke Energy Progress customers, bills would increase by $23.11 in 2027 and $6.59 in 2028. That would take the monthly bill in the first year from $163.84 to $186.95.

Commercial and industrial customers would also experience rate increases.

The Charlotte-based company is looking for an annual revenue increase of $1 billion for Duke Energy Carolinas and $729 million for Duke Energy Progress. Both represent about a 15% increase over existing revenues.

The proposal needs to go before the state utilities commission, which would late schedule public hearings on the request. Those hearings would occur in the spring. The decision would be made in late 2026.

Duke Energy’s proposed plan

The last time Duke Energy requested a rate revision was in 2023. That affected customers’ bills up until this year.

Since then, Duke Energy said it has improved its “self-healing technology,” which detects outages and reroutes power. As of October, the tech has saved almost 2.6 million hours of total outage time, according to the utility.

Duke Energy says its newly proposed rate hikes would increase reliability. It also helps power the growing state, which the utility notes includes new businesses that are mainly manufacturing facilities.

From 2027 to 2028, commercial customers for Duke Energy Carolinas will see increases of 8.7% and 3.9%. Industrial customers will see 6.3% and 3.4%. On the Progress side, commercial hikes will be about 9.2% and 4.6%. Industrial will be around 7.4% and 4.3%.

The utility said residential customer costs reflect what residents use. Large industrial and commercial customers may use more energy, but the demand more predictable, the utility said.

But residential customers are growing as well. The utility added around 150,000 customers in the last two years, according to Duke Energy.

To increase reliability, Duke Energy is focusing on grid upgrades, such as the self-healing technology and upgraded poles.

Duke Energy notes it’ll add new energy sources to its fleet, including the natural gas facilities in Person and Catawba Counties as well as the two proposed natural gas-powered generators in Rowan County.

There’s also the $1.7 billion in battery storage projects the utility proposed in its biennial resource plan it filed in October.

Previous Duke Energy promises of low rates

The proposed rate hike doesn’t align with what Duke Energy has been discussing in other recent proposals.

In the biennial plan, Duke Energy said a customer would see a 2.1% annual increase over the coming decade, according to the plan.

And in Duke Energy’s announcement of the merger between Duke Energy Carolinas and Duke Energy Progress, the utility vowed to save customers more than $1 billion through 2038.

Duke Energy said the proposed rate hike and the proposed resource plan address different needs. The resource plan didn’t factor in grid improvements the way the rate hike plan does.

And with the merger, the utility said the estimated savings are on a gradual scale. It wouldn’t go into effect until the merger is official, which wouldn’t happen until Jan. 1, 2027, if approved.

That’s also the reason why the rate hikes are separated between the two companies. If the rate hike is approved, along with the merger, this would be the last separated increase, the utility said.

Ways to save on energy bill

Duke Energy has several cost saving tools for income-qualified customers.

Weatherization involves installing energy conservation measures in a customer’s home. On an annual average, weatherization has saved customers $150.34 per home.

Smart $aver offers home improvements rebates for efficiency upgrades, including water heaters and insulation. That has saved customers $125.22 per home on average per year.

Other bill management tools or financial assistance services can be found online at duke-energy.com/help or duke-energy.com/BillHelp.

This story was originally published November 20, 2025 at 4:39 PM.