South Carolina Electric & Gas Company (SCE&G), principal subsidiary of SCANA Corporation, announced that it has entered into a settlement agreement with the South Carolina Office of Regulatory Staff and the South Carolina Energy Users Committee related to the company’s petition to update construction and capital cost schedules for the new V.C. Summer nuclear units.
The settlement agreement is subject to approval by the Public Service Commission of South Carolina (PSC). A public hearing on SCE&G’s petition request is scheduled to begin on July 21, 2015.
This settlement agreement is significant because it signifies that no contested issues exist among the settling parties and supports approval of the revised construction and capital cost schedules. In addition to supporting approval of the revised construction and capital cost schedules, the settling parties agreed to revise the allowed Return on Equity (ROE) for the new nuclear project from 11.00 percent to 10.5 percent.
In short, the two consumer advocacy groups agreed not to oppose the revised cost schedules for the nuclear build project that faces delays and rising costs. In March, SCE&G informed regulators that its share of the project costs had risen by $698 million, taking the company’s new total to $5.2 billion.
It blamed $539 million of the added costs on construction delays, which included “contested costs,” for the project.
Completion dates for the units were set back to June 2019 and June 2020 from previous completion dates of late 2018 and late 2019.