Aquatic Protection

As the following list demonstrates, we work hard to reduce the impact of our operations on aquatic life:

 

• At the Brunswick Nuclear Plant near Southport, N.C., which draws water from the lower Cape Fear River, a system of technologies is in place to reduce impingement and entrainment of organisms. This system includes a diversion fence at the mouth of the intake canal, a fish return system, fine mesh screens and seasonal flow minimization. This system has resulted in a drastic reduction of impinged  and entrained organisms, compared to baseline numbers. 
  
   
• The Crystal River Mariculture Center in Citrus County is a multispecies hatchery that has cultivated and released more than 4.1 million fish and crustaceans since 1991, becoming one of the most successful marine-stocking programs in Florida. The center is designed to help protect and responsibly manage natural resources, and contribute to the vitality of local communities.  Each year, the center raises up to 100,000 redfish and spotted seatrout and releases them into the Gulf of Mexico to support year-round fishing – a major driver of tourism in Citrus County. In 2014, the center also started growing freshwater eelgrass, providing more than 8 million individual plants for various springs and lake restoration projects. The native plant limits destructive algae from growing, acts as a filter improving water quality and provides food and shelter for fish and wildlife.
 
• We are a long-time partner in the Robust Redhorse Conservation Committee, a voluntary conservation partnership formed to help recovery and conservation of the robust redhorse fish. This is a rare species of sucker fish native to large Atlantic slope rivers in the Carolinas and Georgia.
 
• A Candidate Conservation Agreement (CCA) for the Sicklefin Redhorse (Moxostoma sp.) was developed in 2016 as a cooperative and collaborative effort among Duke Energy, the Tennessee Valley Authority, tribal, state, federal agencies and other nongovernmental organizations to establish a formal agreement to cooperate on actions that conserve, manage and improve Sicklefin Redhorse populations in western North Carolina and adjacent Georgia. The goal of this CCA is to preclude the need to list the species under the Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA). This CCA is voluntary and adaptive in nature, and it has been developed so that different conservation and management actions can be agreed to and implemented. Duke Energy remains actively engaged in Sicklefin Redhorse conservation efforts.