__NOTOC__ Santee Cooper, also known officially from the 1930s as the South Carolina Public Service Authority, is South Carolina's state-owned electric and water utility that came into being during the

New Deal The New Deal was a series of wide-reaching economic, social, and political reforms enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1938, in response to the Great Depression in the United States, Great Depressi ...

as both a

rural electrification Rural electrification is the process of bringing electrical power to rural and remote areas. Rural communities are suffering from colossal market failures as the national grids fall short of their demand for electricity. As of 2019, 770 million ...

and

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project that created two lakes and cleared large tracts of land while building hydro-electric dams and power plants. Its headquarters are located in

Moncks Corner, South Carolina Moncks Corner is a town in and the county seat of Berkeley County, South Carolina, United States. The population was 7,885 at the 2010 United States census, 2010 census. As defined by the U.S. Census Bureau, Moncks Corner is included within the Ch ...

. As one of the largest power providers in South Carolina, Santee Cooper directly serves more than 165,000 residential and commercial customers in Berkeley, Georgetown, and Horry counties. With a fuel and energy supply that includes coal, nuclear, oil, natural gas, hydroelectric, and other renewable sources, Santee Cooper supplies power to the cities of

Bamberg Bamberg (, , ; East Franconian German, East Franconian: ''Bambärch'') is a town in Upper Franconia district in Bavaria, Germany, on the river Regnitz close to its confluence with the river Main (river), Main. Bamberg had 79,000 inhabitants in ...

and Georgetown, 30 large industrial customers, and Charleston Air Force Base. Santee Cooper generates the power distributed by some of

South Carolina South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...

's electric cooperatives. Following the Nukegate scandal, the

South Carolina General Assembly The South Carolina General Assembly, also called the South Carolina Legislature, is the state legislature of the U.S. state of South Carolina. The legislature is bicameral and consists of the lower South Carolina House of Representatives and ...

debated whether to privatize or reform Santee Cooper, ultimately passing a reform bill that overhauled the regulation and oversight of the state-owned utility.

Management

A board of directors appointed by the governor and approved by the state Senate governs Santee Cooper. A board member represents each congressional district and each of the three counties where Santee Cooper serves retail customers directly; two board member have previous electric cooperative experience; and the chairman is appointed at-large. In September 2017, then-CEO Lonnie Carter announced his retirement following the decision to abandon construction of two new AP1000 nuclear reactors at the Virgil C. Summer Nuclear Generating Station, leaving Santee Cooper with debts of about $4.4 billion for the partial construction. For his leadership and vision, Carter is projected to receive over $800,000 a year in retirement. Following the failure, the predominant issue facing the South Carolina General Assembly from 2018 until the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

in 2020 was whether to sell Santee Cooper or to reform the utility's management. The sale of the utility is favored by Governor McMaster. He called Santee Cooper a "rogue agency" due to its independence and financial problems. NextEra Energy, a Florida-based electric utility, bid to purchase Santee Cooper but withdrew in April 2021. In June 2021, the South Carolina General Assembly passed Act 90, overhauling the regulation of the utility but maintaining its state-owned status. The bill passed unanimously, making it veto-proof.

Post V.C. Summer Reform

Act 90 of 2021, effective after January 1, 2022, brings Santee Cooper under the purview of the South Carolina Public Service Commission, the

regulatory agency A regulatory agency (regulatory body, regulator) or independent agency (independent regulatory agency) is a government agency, government authority that is responsible for exercising autonomous jurisdiction over some area of human activity in a l ...

that oversees

public utilities A public utility company (usually just utility) is an organization that maintains the infrastructure for a public service (often also providing a service using that infrastructure). Public utilities are subject to forms of public control and r ...

in the state. This oversight includes integrated resource planning, service territory changes, facility siting and acquisition, purchase power agreements, and competitive procurement of renewable resources. Rates will continue to be set by the Santee Cooper Board of Directors but are subject to increased scrutiny. The reform will oust all but one of the ten members of the Board of Directors by 2025. It reduces the elected term of a Board Member to four years and places a three-term limit, as well as restrictions on severance packages for exiting members. The board selection process remains the same.

Santee Cooper Lakes

The Santee Cooper Power and Navigation Project, constructed in 1939, improved navigation on and provided

hydroelectric power Hydroelectricity, or hydroelectric power, is Electricity generation, electricity generated from hydropower (water power). Hydropower supplies 15% of the world's electricity, almost 4,210 TWh in 2023, which is more than all other Renewable energ ...

from the Santee and Cooper rivers in

. With the creation of Lake Marion and Lake Moultrie, the project was intended to improve the health, recreation, and economy of the area. At the time, the Santee Cooper Project was the largest land-clearing project in U.S. history, with over 12,500 workers clearing over of swamp and forestland. of dams and dikes were constructed, including a , tall earthen dike. The Pinopolis Dam included the hydroelectric station and navigation lock, the highest single-lift lock in the world. A

spillway A spillway is a structure used to provide the controlled release of water downstream from a dam or levee, typically into the riverbed of the dammed river itself. In the United Kingdom, they may be known as overflow channels. Spillways ensure tha ...

was built to control floodwaters, with 62 gates allowing overflow of excess water. In completing the largest earth-moving project in the nation's history, of earth were moved and 3.1 million cubic yards of concrete were poured. The project also caused substantial hardship to local landowners. The formerly- saline Cooper river became fresh, and the formerly-fresh Santee river became saline, disrupting the local ecological communities. The $48.2 million project (55 percent federal loan, 45 percent federal grant) first generated electricity on February 17, 1942. As transmission lines were built, power flowed to customers in Berkeley, Georgetown and Horry counties, and ultimately to electric cooperatives serving customers in 46 counties.

Projects and power plants

Power plants

In addition to the plants listed above, Santee Cooper has 28 MW of

Landfill gas Landfill gas is a mix of different gases created by the action of microorganisms within a landfill as they decompose organic waste, including for example, food waste and paper waste. Landfill gas is approximately forty to sixty percent methane, ...

generation and 74 MW of wood

biomass Biomass is a term used in several contexts: in the context of ecology it means living organisms, and in the context of bioenergy it means matter from recently living (but now dead) organisms. In the latter context, there are variations in how ...

generation. Santee Cooper has 800 MW of renewable energy generation online or under contract. Santee Cooper owns one-third of the V.C. Summer Nuclear Station operated by Dominion Energy South Carolina, which owns the remaining two-thirds.

Johns Island Transmission Project

Since 2017, Santee Cooper has partnered with Dominion Energy to construct the Johns Island-Queensboro 115kV Transmission project on Johns Island, South Carolina. The 5.1 mile-long transmission line will be the island's second line and has received the requisite approvals from the relevant state agencies as well as the

United States Army Corps of Engineers The United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) is the military engineering branch of the United States Army. A direct reporting unit (DRU), it has three primary mission areas: Engineer Regiment, military construction, and civil wo ...

. It will traverse 2.2 miles of preexisting

right of way A right of way (also right-of-way) is a specific route that people, animals, vehicles, watercraft, or utility lines travel, or the legal status that gives them the right to do so. Rights-of-way in the physical sense include controlled-access h ...

. The utilities will need to acquire approximately 2.9 miles of new right of way. Parts of the line will run through a number of wetlands, including Simmons Creek and Murray Creek. Residents of surrounding neighborhoods have raised concerns about the line's environmental impacts. It is estimated that it would have cost approximately $30 million to bury the line.

References

External links

"History of Santee Cooper"
Santee Cooper, 2015

Santee Cooper Kids, 2003

Charleston Post & Courier, May 25, 2013 {{authority control Municipal electric utilities of the United States Companies based in South Carolina Berkeley County, South Carolina Energy companies established in 1934 1934 establishments in South Carolina