Speaker 1: A right.
Speaker 2: Shares of Duke Energy are down by about two and
Speaker 2: a half percent.
Speaker 1: The company reporting earnings.
Speaker 2: Where they raised their five year capex planned to about
Speaker 2: eighty three billion dollars on increased data center and industrial demand.
Speaker 2: The company also removed certain language concerning methane emissions and
Speaker 2: net zero carbon emissions from their statement.
Speaker 1: We spoke earlier to.
Speaker 2: Lend Good, the chair and chief executive officer at Duke Energy,
Speaker 2: about that data center demand. In the wake of deep
Speaker 2: Seek's emergence and the company's commitment to clean energy.
Speaker 1: The strategy hasn't changed.
Speaker 3: Duke Energy is committed to a future of reliability and affordability,
Speaker 3: increasingly clean energy as we retire older plants and bring
Speaker 3: new things on. But to your point around load growth
Speaker 3: and data centers, we.
Speaker 1: Do see an uptick and.
Speaker 3: Gas generation that wouldn't have been the case five years ago,
Speaker 3: just as we put together plans on how we're going
Speaker 3: to serve this load in this moment. So really committed
Speaker 3: to a future and we see a bright opportunity for
Speaker 3: the company as we pursue this growth.
Speaker 4: I'm curious, Lynn, when we talk about those gas plants,
Speaker 4: and more importantly, some of those coal plants and the
Speaker 4: longer term trajectory. I mean, originally Duke had made plans
Speaker 4: to shut some of those plants. I know you've reversed
Speaker 4: on that, partly because of demand, and I don't know
Speaker 4: how much the new administration is factoring into that. But
Speaker 4: you take your big facility out in Indiana that's now
Speaker 4: supposed to be online, what until twenty thirty eight? Should
Speaker 4: we expect that to be even extended further than twenty
Speaker 4: thirty eight?
Speaker 3: Now, Remaine, we have been working toward a twenty thirty
Speaker 3: five date for retirement of coal, and we really see
Speaker 3: that as being important because these assets are aging. The
Speaker 3: supply chain supporting coal has been challenged, and we expect
Speaker 3: that to continue. But we have always looked at those
Speaker 3: dates as something that has to be reviewed in the
Speaker 3: context or what's going on in the business, and also
Speaker 3: within the context of where our regulators are. And so
Speaker 3: as I think about twenty five to twenty thirty eight,
Speaker 3: I don't look.
Speaker 1: At that as a huge shift.
Speaker 3: Duke is not stepping away from a commitment of modernizing
Speaker 3: our fleet. We're just reflecting the reality of the growth
Speaker 3: that we see in the near term, and how do
Speaker 3: we maintain reliability and keep bills as low as we
Speaker 3: can for customers at the same time pursuing our goals
Speaker 3: for cleaner energy over time.
Speaker 4: I'm glad you used the word reliability, particularly in the
Speaker 4: context of the data centers and AI.
Speaker 1: There's been a lot of talk.
Speaker 4: Amongst the companies, hyperscalers and some of the other end
Speaker 4: users here about having reliable transmission here. Was there any
Speaker 4: shift at all in some of those customers' needs, demands,
Speaker 4: hopes based on what we learned out of Deep Seat
Speaker 4: a couple of weeks ago.
Speaker 3: It's a really good question because there's been so much
Speaker 3: dialogue over the last week about what it means, and
Speaker 3: I would say to you, remain the tone of the
Speaker 3: customers we're dealing with. The hyperscalers that we are dealing
Speaker 3: with has not changed. They have always expected and shared
Speaker 3: with us that energy efficiency would be a part of
Speaker 3: their business model because they know they're big consumers of electricity.
Speaker 3: How can I reduce that demand on the system over time?
Speaker 3: Because I also expect my volume to increase, and so
Speaker 3: as we look at our plans over the next five years,
Speaker 3: we do not see a big impact from this recent event,
Speaker 3: but of course, are continuing to listen for changes in
Speaker 3: the industry, and as I said, we'll expect energy efficiency
Speaker 3: to continue to be an objective for the tech companies
Speaker 3: and we welcome that because the demand for stake broadly
Speaker 3: is just putting an impact on the system.
Speaker 1: That'll demand more and more resources.
Speaker 2: Linn, the other day, I was talking to the Energy
Speaker 2: secretary newly confirmed, and he was talking about coal and
Speaker 2: extending the life of coal plants. He doesn't think there'll
Speaker 2: be a renaissance of coal, but nonetheless I'm curious Lynn
Speaker 2: as to the direct like, what would it take for
Speaker 2: a utility like you guys, the power company, like you guys,
Speaker 2: to say, restart a coal plant.
Speaker 1: I don't see us restarting coal.
Speaker 3: Plants, Alex and I would get back to the business
Speaker 3: case around coal in addition to clean energy. Over time,
Speaker 3: these plants, many of them fifty sixty years old, where
Speaker 3: the decisions around how to maintain and how to replace
Speaker 3: equipment can be challenging when you're looking at a useful
Speaker 3: life that is shortened, and so we believe the right
Speaker 3: answer is to continue to modernize, continue to modernize our fleet, continue.
Speaker 1: To take advantage of new technologies.
Speaker 3: So that we are making the right decisions for our
Speaker 3: customers over the long term, and that has been our
Speaker 3: strategy at Duke. It continues to be our strategy and
Speaker 3: with the growth that we're seeing, this is why natural
Speaker 3: gas is showing up more strongly than it would have
Speaker 3: five years ago, because it represents a base load resource
Speaker 3: that we believe matches this load requirement in this moment,
Speaker 3: and you can see that in some of our plans
Speaker 3: that we think adding those resources is important in this decade,
Speaker 3: but we will continue working toward cleaner energy over time,
Speaker 3: and those plans have not changed.
Speaker 2: You have a five year capital plan that actually increased
Speaker 2: capex to eighty three billion dollars, and I'm assuming a
Speaker 2: lot that is going to be that hyperscaler and that
Speaker 2: data demand.
Speaker 1: Do you think we're ever going to be in a.
Speaker 2: Place where you're going to build like a mini power
Speaker 2: plant right next to a hyperscaler, or is everyone is
Speaker 2: going to be sharing the same power on a grid.
Speaker 3: I'd look at this opportunity alex as being a combination
Speaker 3: of both, and as you can imagine, for customers of
Speaker 3: this scale that have this amount of demand for power,
Speaker 3: we are having conversations with them about how we can
Speaker 3: meet their needs, and it could, for example, include connecting
Speaker 3: to the grid, but also having a backup power supply.
Speaker 1: That we could take advantage of in a peak period.
Speaker 3: There will be demand response opportunities, energy efficiency opportunities, and
Speaker 3: I believe some of them may have an interest in
Speaker 3: having their own on site generation. I think what's important
Speaker 3: is we want to be a part of that part
Speaker 3: of data centers, artificial intelligence, US leadership, and technology.
Speaker 1: We want to be an enabler of that. And so those.
Speaker 3: Conversations with customers are ongoing, and I would say largely
Speaker 3: those conversations taking advantage of the grid for at least some,
Speaker 3: if not all, of their load, and then some of
Speaker 3: these other technologies more on the margin.
Speaker 4: At this point, how cooperative len ARE regulator is going
Speaker 4: to be not necessarily at the federal level, but at
Speaker 4: the local and state level.
Speaker 3: We were hand in glove with our states and local
Speaker 3: communities on economic development, and in this moment we're talking
Speaker 3: about data centers, but think about expansion of life sciences,
Speaker 3: think about advanced manufacturing. We have had a long standing
Speaker 3: partnership around economic development and the states see data centers
Speaker 3: as an important part of economic development, particularly at the
Speaker 3: local level property taxes for example, that could be important
Speaker 3: to a community.
Speaker 1: So we're an.
Speaker 3: Ongoing dialogue, also ongoing dialogue with regulators. Their interest is
Speaker 3: in making sure if we add this load that we're
Speaker 3: not in some way subsidizing that load with other customers.
Speaker 1: So those conversations.
Speaker 3: Are ongoing, and we have a lot of experience in
Speaker 3: how to execute those types of contracts and we see
Speaker 3: them as being relevant to this moment as well.
Speaker 4: N Good there, the chief executive officer over at Duke Energy,