State Senate leader Phil Berger wants to repeal a carbon reduction mandate the legislature put on Duke Energy four years ago.
would eliminate a requirement that Duke reduce its carbon dioxide emissions by 70% before 2030. The bill passed its first committee Tuesday, less than 24 hours after it was filed. Sen. Paul Newton, R-Cabarrus and a former Duke Energy executive, is co-sponsoring the bill with Berger.
Berger said the clean energy mandate is likely to result in higher electric bills. He said the change would give utility companies more flexibility to build new sources of power like nuclear plants; Duke recently announced it's , the first such plant in decades.
"North Carolinians shouldn't be saddled with the increased costs created by arbitrary benchmarks," Berger said in a news release.
Part of the 2021 clean energy law that calls for carbon neutrality by 2050 would remain in effect. Sen. Steve Jarvis, R-Davidson, said it makes sense to give Duke more time to work toward that goal.
"It's prudent of us to extend time," he said. "The shorter you put a case together, the more costly that utility is going to have to charge, and the ratepayers will end up paying the bill."
Opponents say lawmakers are letting Duke off the hook for mandates they haven't tried hard enough to meet. Sen. DeAndrea Salvador, D-Mecklenburg, urged her Senate colleagues to slow down the legislation and allow more time for input.
"I think our state has a really incredible longstanding history of being collaborative on energy policy," she said. "Some of our most transformative steps forward is when we get really knowledgeable people in the room to discuss and maybe to showcase things that otherwise might have just been accidentally missed."
The Senate Agriculture, Energy, and Environment Committee denied Salvador's request to delay a vote until a future committee meeting.
The bill would also make it easier for Duke to adjust electric rates to cover the cost of new power plants under construction. A news release promoting the bill says that change would improve "predictability of costs for North Carolinians."
Critics worry that could leave electric customers footing the bill if a new power facility gets cancelled before it's completed 鈥� something that happened in South Carolina with a failed nuclear plant. Newton said the state's Utilities Commission would still have the power to block rate increases if Duke Energy spends inappropriately.
"They're under intense scrutiny by the commission, and they only recover (costs of) the things that are that are prudently spent and they're used for the benefit of the public," Newton said.
Lobbyists for several industry groups spoke in favor of the bill during Tuesday's committee hearing, and they said they'd like to see even more elements of the 2021 carbon reduction legislation tweaked or eliminated.
