South Carolina Electricity Rates per kWh: Dominion, Duke and the Court Fight

Dominion’s 2026 increase was reported as $11.97 a month, but a second step from an older case landed weeks later, making about $18. Duke, meanwhile, has taken a brand new yearly rate programme to the state Supreme Court. We set out what each utility is doing to South Carolina bills.

Two Dominion steps within weeks

Dominion Energy South Carolina homes faced two separate increases in the summer of 2026, from two different cases. Each was reported on its own.

Dominion put the starting bill at about $159, so the two would come to about 12% on our arithmetic. It filed on 2 January asking for 12.73%, about $19.98 a month. The 8 May settlement cut the revenue from $322 million to $207 million. The Public Service Commission voted for it on 11 June. Other customer classes were put at 4.86%, 5.65% and 9.02%. Residential customers also share a $3 million bill credit this year, and $1 million a year for three years goes to payment help and weatherization.

We have not seen the written order, and neither company nor regulator publishes the combined figure above. Dominion’s customers are also still paying, through rates, for debt from the abandoned V.C. Summer reactors.

Duke took a new law to the Supreme Court

A May 2025 energy law created a rate stabilization programme: instead of a full case, an electric utility may seek a yearly adjustment for up to five years, with its return left alone. Duke Energy Progress, which serves the Pee Dee, applied in March 2026, the first electric utility in the state to do so.

It first proposed 6.6%, then 4% after objections from state watchdogs. The filing came 41 days after an earlier increase that took a standard 1,000 kWh Pee Dee bill up $11.23, to about $156. On 15 July the Commission let Duke into the programme but barred any increase until a year after it applied. Duke appealed to the South Carolina Supreme Court, saying the delay would add $6 million in financing costs that customers would ultimately pay. The Department of Consumer Affairs asked the court to dismiss the appeal. We found no ruling, and have booked a check.

Why it matters beyond one company: this is the first test of how fast a South Carolina utility can use the yearly route. Duke plans to merge its two South Carolina utilities in January 2027, though Pee Dee and Upstate homes are expected to stay on separate rates for a while. Upstate homes already pay about $10 a month less.

Santee Cooper ends its long freeze

Santee Cooper, which sells directly to homes in Horry, Berkeley and Georgetown counties and wholesale to most of the state’s co-ops, could not raise rates from 2020 to the end of 2024 under the settlement that followed V.C. Summer. Its board then approved new base rates from April 2025, roughly $11 on a typical monthly bill, and on 30 October 2026 voted for two more steps: 4.7% from February 2027 and 4.6% in 2028.

Because co-ops buy from it, those steps can spread beyond Santee Cooper’s own customers, though each co-op sets its own retail price.

Reading a Dominion or Duke bill

Homes cannot shop for a supplier. Bills have a basic charge and a price per kWh that includes the fuel component the Commission resets each year. Summer use is nearly double spring use, so divide a year of bills by a year of kWh if you can, or let the utility menu supply a 2025 average.

Who charged what in 2025

Dominion billed 16.41¢ per kWh on average. Duke Energy Carolinas charged 13.47¢ and Duke Energy Progress 14.09¢. Santee Cooper’s own homes paid 12.91¢.

EIA-861 for 2025: each utility’s revenue from homes divided by the kWh they used, so monthly charges are spread into the price.

Co-ops vary more. Horry Electric charged 13.83¢ and York Electric 13.68¢; Blue Ridge Electric, in the north-west corner, charged 19.82¢, the highest large figure. Rock Hill’s city utility charged 12.34¢.

July, then January

The average home used 1,499 kWh in July and 770 in April, with a second peak of 1,282 in January. Bills ran from $129 to $232. Use ranks 11th of 51 and the yearly bill 12th. In the latest year July 2026 ($232) was dearest and November 2025 ($129) cheapest.

From 10.5¢ to nearly 16¢

The 10.50¢ of 2010 became 15.77¢, up 50%. The 2010s moved in fits, to 13.0¢ in 2017 and back to 12.4¢ in 2018, and 2016 and 2017 are the only years South Carolina paid above the US average. Prices have risen every year since 2021.

The same Duke costs about 1¢ less next door

South Carolina came 26th of 51 and 5th of the 9 South Atlantic states and DC. North Carolina, on the same two Duke utilities, paid about 1¢ less, and Georgia a little less too.

Across the border: North Carolina 14.79¢, Georgia 15.17¢.

All 50 states and DC on one page, with a map.

Where the sources stop

The Duke timeline rests on press reports, including the South Carolina Daily Gazette’s, not the order. The Dominion figures are from its settlement page and news reports, and the vote date from AARP. Eleven months have moved 8% or more since 2010. August 2018 fell about 20% and September rose as much; we found no rate change to explain it. EIA’s figures are shown as reported.

Figures to August 2026 (EIA marks recent months preliminary), utility figures for 2025, refreshed 3 November 2026. How every number in this series is made and checked.

• South Carolina, every month since 2010 (CSV): price per kWh, kWh and bill per home, and the US price.
• Every state, DC and the US (CSV)
• Everything above with the utility and supplier figures (JSON)

EIA data is in the public domain: credit the U.S. Energy Information Administration. A link back is welcome.

Questions

Electricity rates in other states

Version history

• 2.0 (6 November 2026): rebuilt around Dominion’s two steps added together, Duke’s appeal over the new rate programme, and Santee Cooper’s next increases.
• 1.0.1 (November 2026): wording and page heading tidied; no figures changed.
• 1.0 (November 2026): first published.