February 2, 2021: Last week, the Sierra Club, North Carolina Attorney General, North Carolina Public Staff, and Duke Energy agreed to settle multiple ongoing rate cases in which Duke was seeking full cost recovery and a rate of return for cleaning up the roughly 100 million tons of coal ash sitting in pits around the state.
In 2014, after the collapse of a pipe under a coal ash pit that sent 70 miles of toxic sludge into the Dan River, pressure on Duke to take greater responsibility for its coal ash sites increased significantly. In late 2019, Sierra Club, alongside our allies, forced Duke to excavate nearly 80 million tons of coal ash and move it to dry, lined storage facilities on site--combined with previous agreements, this meant that more than 100 million tons of coal ash will be removed.
The agreement filed last Monday means Duke is responsible for paying roughly 25% of the costs of clean up through 2030--that is, more than $1.1 billion for which customers won't have to foot the bill. The parties also agreed to negotiate on post-2030 costs, which could save customers even more in the future.
The settlement largely wraps up a decade-long effort--including four separate evidentiary hearings and an appeal to the North Carolina Supreme Court--to force Duke to do the right thing for communities and customers. Senior Attorney Bridget Lee has been leading this work for the Sierra Club Environmental Law Program, alongside ELP Senior Attorney Dori Jaffe, former ELP legal fellows Olivia Glasscock, Andrea Marshall, and Sari Amiel, former ELP litigation assistants Tess Fields, Francesca DiJulio, and Olivia Klunk, local counsel Cathy Cralle Jones, Bryan Brice, and Matthew Quinn, Beyond Coal Campaign staff including Melissa Williams, Dave Rogers, Will Harlan, Zach Kopkin, Jillian Riley, and Luis Rodriguez, North Carolina Chapter leaders, and our partners the Alliance of Carolinians Together Against Coal Ash (ACT coalition) and the Southern Environmental Law Center.