Charleston Reporter

This month marked 20 years since Santee Cooper committed to becoming the first state utility to provide renewable power to customers, and has been successfully powering homes and businesses ever since, the Moncks Corner-based company said in a company release. 

On Sept. 4, 2001, Santee Cooper started converting methane gas from Horry County Solid Waste Authority into electricity, a process that takes a greenhouse gas and turns it into renewable power instead of polluting the atmosphere. 

The subdivision, Santee Cooper Green Power, became the first green energy provider within the state of South Carolina. 

“When I think about Santee Cooper and Green Power, I often think about firsts. Creating Green Power from methane gas, we were the first in the state to do that. We introduced solar power to utility customers in 2006. We also installed the first-in-the-state, utility-scale solar program and, even today, we’re expanding that greatly," Jim Rabon, senior manager of conservation and energy efficiency, said in the release. 

In the last two decades, Santee Cooper was able to increase its Green Power portfolio and successfully generate over 1.2 million megawatt-hours (MWh) of Green Power. It also garnered 478 megawatts (MW) of renewable energy online or under contract with Central Electric Power Cooperative, according to Santee Cooper.