We're planting seeds across the Duke Power service area to grow a stronger manufacturing work force. We're putting our dollars to work so our neighbors can go to work.
      Duke Power has an innovative approach to a pressing issue: a profit-sharing program to promote economic development in the Carolinas. Duke Power shares 50 percent of its profits from short-term, interruptible wholesale electricity sales. These dollars are used to reduce rates or fund programs to make industrial customers more competitive...to fund new education and training programs... and to provide assistance with power bills for low-income customers as the Carolinas go through an economic transition.
      Duke Power is providing up to $3 million annually for four years to North Carolina community colleges' manufacturing training programs — a major component of this unique profit-sharing program. A similar arrangement is in place in South Carolina through AdvanceSC (a limited liability company) where an independent board of directors administers the grants.
      James Hudgins, South Carolina Technical College System president and executive director of the South Carolina State Board for Technical and Comprehensive Education, calls the sharing arrangement "the kind of creative and proactive remedy we must seek if we are to reverse the manufacturing job losses and painful economic distress many communities in our state are facing." Martin Lancaster, president of the North Carolina Community College System, echoes Hudgins' remarks adding the arrangement is "an extraordinary act of philanthropy."
      So far 17 education grants have been awarded in the Carolinas directed to many innovative initiatives such as industrial technical training at Forsyth Technical Community College in Winston-Salem, North Carolina where a $249,600 grant will help. At Greenville Technical College in South Carolina a $200,000 grant from AdvanceSC will help establish a center for research and education of aviation technology enterprises.
      Another example proves leverage is powerful. A $250,000 North Carolina Community College Grant enabled Central Piedmont Community College (CPCC) in Charlotte to pursue additional funding for an interactive training curriculum on manufacturing systems. The result? Matching state and federal dollars grew CPCC's funding to $1 million — and the Charlotte campus will be home to a new high-tech training facility for displaced manufacturing workers.
      This sharing arrangement brings out our best — and helps bring out the best in our region.
      - Tony Almeida, Vice President,Duke Power Economic Development