Duke Energy Responds to Gubernatorial Candidates’ Remarks Concerning Cliffside Air Permit

CHARLOTTE, N.C. - The following is a statement Duke Energy Carolinas President Ellen Ruff gave today in response to the suggestion by political candidates Beverly Perdue and Richard Moore that there should be a delay in the issuance of the final air permit for Duke Energy’s Cliffside project.

“We are disappointed that any candidate for political office would ignore the long-term economic and environmental benefits of the Cliffside modernization project.

“Delaying the decision means postponing the environmental benefits of immediately retiring four older, less efficient coal units at Cliffside; delaying investment of $50 million a year in energy efficiency; and postponing the retirement of up to 800 megawatts of older coal units as we deliver more energy efficiency to our customers.

“The North Carolina Utilities Commission issued a ‘certificate of need’ for our project in March 2007. The commission also determined that it was imprudent for us to depend too much on natural gas to meet our customers’ growing demand for power.

“The state’s experts have approved the construction of this unit, a water permit and a draft air permit. Let’s let the experts who have performed an exhaustive review of our permit make the decision about the Cliffside modernization project based on the facts.”

Duke Energy’s Carolinas’ operations include nuclear, coal-fired, natural gas and hydroelectric generation. That diverse fuel mix provides nearly 21,000 megawatts of safe, reliable and competitively priced electricity to more than 2.3 million electric customers in a 24,000-square-mile service area of North Carolina and South Carolina.

Duke Energy, one of the largest electric power companies in the United States, supplies and delivers energy to approximately 4 million U.S. customers. The company has approximately 36,000 megawatts of electric generating capacity in the Midwest and the Carolinas, and natural gas distribution services in Ohio and Kentucky. In addition, Duke Energy has more than 4,000 megawatts of electric generation in Latin America, and is a joint-venture partner in a U.S. real estate company.

Headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., Duke Energy is a Fortune 500 company traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol DUK. More information about the company is available on the Internet at: www.duke-energy.com.