House adopts bill allowing utilities to securitize storm costs before prudency review

The South Carolina House on third reading adopted House Bill 37 56, which allows electric utilities to issue securitized debt to recover major storm costs before the state Public Service Commission completes a prudency review.

Representative Gatch, the bill’s floor sponsor, cited Hurricane Helene and the extraordinary costs utilities faced during that storm as context: "The only thing that's different about this bill is that it allows Duke...and other utilities with this half a billion dollars in debt...to go ahead and sell that debt to the bond market, and then go through, in a year's time, go through the recouping process, the prudency review," he said on the floor.

Under current law, utilities typically wait until after a prudency review by the Public Service Commission to use securitization — a process that converts storm‑related costs into long‑term bonds sold to investors, reducing near‑term rate pressure on customers. The amendment adopted on the floor keeps guardrails, sponsors said: if the commission later finds utility charges were not prudent, the utility must refund those amounts to ratepayers with interest.

Supporters said the change helps utilities manage extraordinary, unanticipated storm costs without waiting for a sometimes lengthy regulatory review process. Opponents raised standard concerns about consumer protections and insisted on the strictness of penalties if charges are later disallowed.

The amendment to allow the accelerated securitization process was adopted and then the full bill, as amended, was adopted on the third reading. The transcript records the amendment adoption and a final passage vote; the clerk declared House Bill 37 56 adopted.