Duke Energy Gets A Base Rate Increase, Your Bill To Go Lower

This is an interesting situation as far as the cost of energy and electric in the state of Florida is concerned as The Florida Public Service Commission formally approved Duke Energy Florida’s proposed energy rate agreement on Wednesday August 21st. While the first thing we see is an increase of the base rate annually from 2025 to 2027 and the obvious first thought is now it will cost even more to keep the lights on, but we dug further into this to provide some context.

Plenty of Florida sun to create clean powerPhoto byAndreas GücklhornonUnsplash

Back on July 15, 2024, Duke Energy Florida, consumer representatives and business groups reached a comprehensive agreement that will increase reliability and also advances the clean energy vision for the state. They also have an additional focus on ways to assist and pass on savings to customers. It appears that this group was able to lower the original budget ask of $503 million in 2025 down to $203 million, so they cut $300 million of cost in the plan.

The Florida Public Service Commission is committed to making sure that Florida's consumers receive some of their most essential services — electric, natural gas, telephone, water, and wastewater — in a safe, reasonable, and reliable manner and they approved this multiyear agreement will allow for an increase in base rates, among making other provisions. This agreement also provides flexibility for the company’s most vulnerable customers in Florida during times of need and extreme weather events, including suspending disconnects for nonpayment of electric bills when actual temperatures reach 95 degrees or greater.

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It is important to note that base rates are just a portion of the bill, and do not reflect the entire amount due. With this plan in place the company still expects typical residential customers to see a decrease as soon as their January 2025 bill when compared to December 2024. This is because the 2022 fuel under-recovery, storm restoration cost recovery and legacy purchased power contracts will expire year-end 2024, and in turn will lower overall bills in 2025.

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What is the actual plan encompassing? It has 3 main pillars - modernizing the existing grid, enhancing the power plants, and adding additional clean energy sources including solar.

Duke Energy will continue modernizing the grid from 2025 through 2027 in anticipation of population growth and technological advancements. Some of these investments include expanding capacity of the electric grid by building new substations, expanding existing substations and installing new or larger circuits to provide reliable service in the growing state. Additionally, Duke Energy is upgrading or replacing poles, cables and safety devices to create a more resilient and reliable grid to reduce the impact from power interruptions to our 2 million customers. Florida customers receive a direct benefit from the company’s grid investments through improved reliability, including fewer outages and shorter restoration times.

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The enhancements to Florida’s power plants are aimed at reduce fuel consumption, generating immediate and future customer savings. These projects make the units more efficient by allowing them to produce more power with the same amount of fuel. Duke Energy estimates Florida customers will save $150 million to $200 million per year in reduced fuel costs from this investment.

Companies like Disney have their own solar panels some can be seen off of 429Photo byAmerican Public Power AssociationonUnsplash

Duke Energy will build 12 new solar plants between 2025 and 2027, which adds another 900 megawatts (MW) of clean energy to Florida’s grid. The company will also continue exploring innovative clean energy technologies, such as long-duration energy storage and the DeBary Hydrogen project, a clean energy hydrogen production and storage system.

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With so many electric vehicles entering the roads and our homes it is even more important than ever that energy is modernized, safe and affordable for all Florida residents. Do you belive that Duke has taken the right steps to meet the future demands and lower our bills?