Duke Energy reported third-quarter earnings of $1.4 billion ($1.81/share), up from a year earlier on higher retail sales volume and new rates.
“We approach 2026 with momentum as our company converts large load economic development prospects into tangible projects with signed electric service agreements, and we are already turning dirt on projects to meet this load and grow,” CEO Harry Sideris said on an earnings call Nov. 7. “We’re carrying out an ambitious generation bill that will add more than 13 GW of capacity to our system in the next five years.”
Duke expects its new five-year capital plan for 2026 to 2030 to be between $95 billion and $105 billion, up from the $87 billion that was planned for 2025 to 2029. The spending will help Duke modernize its system and bring new large load customers like data centers online, Sideris said.
“The step up is primarily related to investments in new generation that will drive earnings-based growth of more than 8.5% through 2030,” Sideris said.
While investments are accelerating, Sideris said Duke is keeping affordability in mind for its customers, both large industrials competing in global markets and households trying to manage their budgets.
“We continue to leverage AI and pursue a technology-enabled industry leading cost structure as we invest in our system,” Sideris said. “Other tools we are utilizing to keep rates as low as possible include the combination of the Duke Energy Carolinas and Duke Energy Progress utilities, which, if approved, would save retail customers more than $1 billion through 2038.”
Other activities on affordability include storm cost securitization, which Sideris said would cut the impact to bills by 18% compared to traditional mechanisms, and new tariffs and contract provisions for large load customers looking to take service from its utilities, he added.
“These are just a few of the many solutions we use to ensure our 10 million customers receive the service they count on at a fair price,” Sideris said. “We recognize that our work to provide affordable energy for customers is never done, but we are proud that average rate changes have paced below the rate of inflation over the last decade, and that our rates are well below the national average.”
Duke is building 8.5 GW of new dispatchable generation across its footprint over the next five years, which includes 1 GW of uprates. The rest is new natural gas plants.
The company is considering new nuclear plants, both small modular reactors and, after a request from the North Carolina Utilities Commission, traditional nuclear.
“We feel nuclear is a very important part of the future,” Sideris said. “With that said, there’s a lot of things that we have to determine and figure out before we move forward. We’re encouraged to see the government and some of the partnerships with Westinghouse that were recently announced leaning into this and addressing supply chain concerns, which is one of the items that we have on our list.
“We still need to figure out what we’re going to do with cost overrun protection and how we’re going to protect our investors and our customers from overruns on those projects, as well as how we’re going to protect the balance sheet if we move forward with nuclear, so we’re working to resolve those working with government officials as well as some of the tech customers.”
