South Carolina Base Load Review Act

The official South Carolina code still prints the Base Load Review Act and also prints a 2018 editor's note that bars a new base load review application, other than a docket then pending, and says the article is repealed when specified V.C. Summer abandonment litigation concludes. The printed plant definition covers new coal or nuclear units of at least 350 megawatts gross. It is not a small modular reactor category. The 2018 act and the litigation record were not opened.

Category: Laws, rules and executive directives
Status: In effect
Instrument: statute · S.C. Code Ann. §§ 58-33-210 to 58-33-280 (Base Load Review Act)
Issued by: South Carolina General Assembly
Jurisdiction: South Carolina
Affects: Utility cost recovery
In effect from: 3 May 2007 · actual · day
Expiry or completion: None recorded
Operative text: South Carolina Code of Laws, Title 58, Chapter 33 (Official Title 58, Chapter 33 compilation, opened 4 October 2026)
Last checked · next review: 2026-10-04 · 2027-04-15

Legal and geographic scope

Official Title 58, Chapter 33 page opened 4 October 2026. Article 4 is printed as the Base Load Review Act. Its history line says 2007 Act No. 16 became law without the governor's signature on 3 May 2007. The printed definition of a base load plant is a new coal or nuclear fueled generating unit or facility designed to run at a capacity factor above 70 percent a year, with a gross initial generation capacity of 350 megawatts or more, intended at least in part to serve the utility's South Carolina retail customers. The same page prints a 2018 editor's note quoting Act No. 258: as of that act's effective date, the Public Service Commission must not accept a base load review application or consider other requests under Article 4 except in a docket then pending, and Article 4 is repealed upon the conclusion of litigation concerning the abandonment of V.C. Summer Units 2 and 3. The page also still prints the article's cost-recovery sections, including preconstruction costs of a nuclear-powered facility. This record does not find that the litigation has ended or that the article has been repealed. The definition is not a small modular reactor category, and the article does not issue a reactor license.

Not approved or still pending

2018 Act No. 258 and 2018 Joint Resolution 285 were not opened as separate documents. No court record was opened, so the compilation's statement that Article 4 is repealed when the V.C. Summer Units 2 and 3 abandonment litigation concludes is not a finding that the litigation has ended. 2007 Act No. 16 was not opened beyond the text and history printed on the chapter page. No project is linked. The article does not approve a reactor.

Dated lifecycle

3 May 2007 · actual · day · Took effect — The compilation's history line for section 58-33-210 says 2007 Act No. 16, Section 2, effective upon approval, and that it became law without the governor's signature on 3 May 2007. Act No. 16 was not opened as a separate document. (South Carolina Code of Laws, Title 58, Chapter 33)

Definitions in this instrument

Base load plant (S.C. Code Ann. § 58-33-220(2)): A new coal or nuclear fueled electrical generating unit or units or facility, designed for a capacity factor exceeding 70 percent annually, with a gross initial generation capacity of 350 megawatts or more, and intended in whole or in part to serve retail customers of a utility in South Carolina. The coal-plant emissions clause in the same definition is not restated.
Legal definition used by this instrument only; SMRMap's inclusion rule for SMRs is separate and unchanged.

Projects or designs named by the source

None. Location in this jurisdiction does not make a project eligible for, or approved under, this measure.

Sources

South Carolina Code of Laws, Title 58, Chapter 33 (government_primary, accessed 2026-10-04)