Duke Energy bills likely to go up to pay for Helene recovery

It's been more than five weeks since Hurricane Helene caused historic damage in western North Carolina, and several communities are still without power.

Duke Energy says the damage in those areas is catastrophic, and they've used helicopters and specialized off-road vehicles to rebuild the power infrastructure.

All that comes at a cost that is likely to add up to hundreds of millions of dollars.

Duke Energy customers will now be asked to cover that cost.

Duke Energy tells 5 On Your Side that later this year, they will ask the North Carolina Utilities Commission to let them issue storm bonds for Hurricane Helene and other storm related costs from 2020 to 2024.

If approved by the utilities commission, Duke Energy customers would see an additional storm recovery rider charge on their bills starting late in 2025 or early in 2026 to pay off those bonds.

Duke says paying for storm recovery this way is less expensive for customers than if they raised base electricity rates.

They say the last time they issued storm bonds it saved customers $300 million in repair costs following storms in 2018 and 2019.

At this point, it's not clear how much a new monthly storm recovery charge will cost each customer.