Powering a Reliable and Sustainable Future
Santee Cooper is a state-owned, not-for-profit utility that develops base rates for our customers based on the cost of providing reliable service to our customers. We regularly review our rates to ensure the price customers pay is fair and transparent. We monitor costs of providing service and projected revenues and we consider adjusting rates when we expect our existing rates will not be sufficient to recover our future costs.
2026 Rate Study
Santee Cooper is considering rate changes and has launched a months-long public comment process so that customers and others can review and provide input on the proposed changes.
Santee Cooper must continue investing in its electric system to maintain strong reliability and make critical upgrades. The utility has proposed an average 3.3% increase across its retail customer classes in 2027, paired with rate structure updates shaped by customer feedback. Another overall average increase of 3.1% is proposed for 2028.
Proposed Base Rate Adjustments
The proposed 2027 adjustment includes average increases of 4.7% for residential customers, 2.9% for commercial customers, 3.2% for lighting customers, and 2.6% for industrial customers. The proposed 2028 adjustment includes increases of 4.6% for residential, 2.9% for commercial, 3% for lighting and 2.1% for industrial customers.
We Listened
Santee Cooper held customer focus groups earlier this year, and the proposed rate changes incorporate feedback from those sessions. For example, revised residential and small commercial customer rates include changes in how demand charges are calculated, and intended to reduce the impact of isolated spikes in electricity usage on customer bills.
Balanced Demand Billing
Instead of billing demand on a single highest-hour charge, the new Balanced Demand Billing would include a charge for the average of a customer’s maximum hourly use during the four highest peak periods each month. Additionally, the commercial peak window has been shortened from four hours to three, aligning business peak hours with residential and giving customers more flexibility to manage costs.
VIDEO: What is Demand?
Customer Impacts
Customers use electricity in different ways. Click on your customer class below to learn how the proposed rates could impact you.
How You Can Get Involved
Santee Cooper’s residential, commercial, industrial, municipal light and power, and certain wholesale customers have the right to review the proposed rate schedules; appear and speak in person concerning the proposed rates at public meetings or specified meetings of the Board of Directors; and submit written comments.
- July 30, 2026: Deadline for submission of written comments.
- Aug. 31, 2026:Deadline for oral comments at the Board of Directors meeting.
Santee Cooper will respond to reasonable questions and requests for information that we have received by the end of the oral comment period on Aug 31, 2026.
Rate Study Mission and Pricing Principles
To guide Santee Cooper as it studies potential new rates, Santee Cooper follows these pricing principles:
- Mission: Limit price increases to less than inflation.
- Equity: Allocate costs to specific customer classes in a reasonable, equitable and defensible manner.
- Efficiency: Design prices so that conservation savings are shared with the customers.
- Adequacy: Provide sufficient revenue to preserve the financial integrity of Santee Cooper.
- Notice: Ensure customer notice and engagement in rate proceedings.
- Protection: Allow reasonable relief mechanisms for financially distressed customers.
- Transparency: Require openness in annual review of compliance with Pricing Principles.
These pricing principles were adopted by Santee Cooper’s Board of Directors in January 2020 and readopted in June 2024.
Additional Documents and Information
- Customers can request information from Santee Cooper here.
Frequently Asked Questions
We monitor costs of providing service and projected revenues and we consider adjusting rates when we expect our existing rates will not be sufficient to recover our future costs. Santee Cooper must continue investing in its electric system to maintain strong reliability and make critical upgrades.
To learn more about how your rate is changing, click on your rate class below.
Electricity is flowing constantly to supply power to our homes and businesses. Demand is defined by how much electricity is being used at any given time. The more electricity a home or business is using at the same moment, the higher their demand. Learn more by viewing our video.
It is our job at Santee Cooper to make sure we always have enough electricity available to supply all our customers, no matter how many appliances or heating/cooling systems are being used at one time. As the number of homes and businesses on our system continues to grow, so does the total demand we must serve. It costs Santee Cooper more to serve high demands, and the peak-hour demand charge receives that higher cost from the customers who drive it.
To learn more about your demand, click on your rate class below.
To learn more about how the proposed rates will impact your bill, click on your rate class below.
For tips on how residential customers can reduce bills, click here.
If approved, the rate increase will go into effect on Feb. 1, 2027, with the subsequent increase on Feb. 1, 2028.
Santee Cooper’s residential, commercial, industrial, municipal light and power, and certain wholesale customers have the right to review the proposed rate schedules; appear and speak in person concerning the proposed rates at public meetings or the specified meetings of the Board of Directors; and submit written comments.
Santee Cooper is a not-for-profit public power utility owned by the State of South Carolina and does not have shareholders.