Walmart Asks North Carolina to Reopen Comments on Duke’s 150 MW Data Center Tariff Deal, Negotiated Without It
- Data Centers Grid Capacity Regulatory State & Local Regulation
Marin Holt
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- Walmart filing: October 12, 2026, NCUC dockets E-7 Sub 1329 and E-2 Sub 1380
- Provision at issue: 150 MW or more on the high-load-factor tariff regardless of load factor
- Tariff trigger: 50 MW at 80% load factor
- Minimum billing demand: 75% of contract demand
- Proposed comment deadline: October 30, 2026
Walmart asked the North Carolina Utilities Commission on October 12, 2026 to allow another round of comments on Duke Energy’s large load tariff settlement. Duke Energy Carolinas and Duke Energy Progress had filed that settlement six days earlier with Amazon Data Services, Google, Microsoft, Andale LLC, the industrial customer groups, the U.S. Department of Defense and the commission’s own Public Staff. Walmart is not asking regulators to reject the deal. Its lawyers wrote that the company was not included in nor aware of the talks and did not learn of them until after the agreement was submitted.
The settlement sits inside the two Duke rate cases, dockets E-7, Sub 1329 and E-2, Sub 1380. It defines a large load customer as one with a contract demand of 50 MW or more and an expected 12-month rolling average load factor of 80% or more, or any customer with a contract demand of 150 MW or more. It applies to letter agreements and electric service agreements executed on and after June 1, 2026. Those customers take service on Schedule HLF with a minimum billing demand of 75% of contract demand. Contracts below 100 MW run at least 10 years, and contracts of 100 MW or more run at least 15 years.
Walmart’s objection goes to three provisions it says were not in the record when earlier comments were due. The first puts any customer forecasting 150 MW or more on the high-load-factor tariff regardless of its expected load factor. The second measures load factor over a rolling 12-month period. The third commits the signatories to collaborate on a standard electric service agreement and to submit it within 30 days of a final order. Walmart says that wording leaves other participants out of future discussions.
The retailer also questioned the timing. According to the filing, Duke sought two extensions to submit replies to earlier comments, citing the complexity of the issues. The commission granted the last extension on October 1 and moved the reply deadline to October 6, the day the settlement landed. Walmart did not object to the extensions, and now says it would have opposed them had it known a smaller group was negotiating. The filing argues that approval without further comment would deprive excluded parties of due process. It also disputes the settlement’s description of itself as a give-and-take of contested issues.
The Carolina Utility Customers Association, the North Carolina Sustainable Energy Association, the North Carolina Justice Center coalition and the Carolinas Clean Energy Business Association support the request. The Public Staff and Harris Teeter do not object. Microsoft and the industrial customer groups would accept another comment period only if signatories could respond to what the other parties file, a condition Walmart opposes. Duke, Google, the state attorney general and Nucor Steel Lexington took no position. Walmart asked for 10 days after an authorizing order to file supplemental comments and proposed October 30 as the deadline.
Why It Matters
The settlement is the first public floor for how data centers pay in Duke’s North Carolina territory. It repurposes an existing tariff and would replace the confidential, one-off service agreements Duke signs today. Duke’s original June proposal would have made big customers pay a minimum bill amount for at least a decade. The company now forecasts 8 gigawatts of large customer demand in the Carolinas by 2035 and is using that forecast to justify 9.7 gigawatts of new gas plants. At least 75 such tariffs have been proposed or approved in some 35 states.
The money question Walmart cares about is still open. New data centers pay upfront for dedicated facilities such as substations, but other network upgrade costs are spread across all customers in the beginning and paid back over the course of the data center’s contract. A customer that exits early pays only a fraction of its remaining balance, and the tariff’s liquidated damages include 25% of remaining minimum billing demand charges. Duke must provide a large load class cost of service analysis in its next rate case, which could be two years from now. Nick Jimenez of the Southern Environmental Law Center put the risk plainly: if a data center never gets built, “the rest of us are stuck holding the bag, paying for those assets.” Walmart’s filing does not establish whether the settlement would raise or lower rates for Walmart or anyone else. It asks only to be heard before the commission decides.
Critical Perspective
Walmart asks for 10 days of comment, not a different tariff, and it signed the July 23 rate case stipulation that created the very docket where this deal was struck. The 150 MW provision it objects to reaches only the largest campuses, and the 50 MW trigger sits far above any retail store, so the filing never says what rate exposure Walmart itself faces beyond the network upgrade costs spread across all customers in a contract’s early years. Microsoft and the industrial groups offered a second round on the ordinary condition that signatories could reply, and Walmart refused it. The settlement defers large load cost allocation to a rate case two years away, which leaves the 75% minimum bill as the only protection in force before then. Will a fight over who was in the room change any of those numbers?
Sources
- North State Journal: Walmart challenges Duke Energy deal with tech giants over electricity rates (Oct 24, 2026)
- Agreement and Stipulation of Settlement on Large Load Tariff, NCUC Dockets E-7 Sub 1329 and E-2 Sub 1380 (filed Oct 6, 2026; copy hosted by SELC)
- WUNC/WFAE: Duke Energy comes to an agreement on long-sought large-load tariff for data centers (Oct 7, 2026)
- Canary Media: Duke Energy proposes special rules for data centers in North Carolina (June 2026)
