A peek inside new Duke Energy control center that's preparing for the future

Duke Energy is launching a new Energy Control Center this week. It's replacing the old one which was built in the 1980s.

This facility controls the electricity for more than one point seven million users and uses multiple energy sources.

The inside may look like the Starship Enterprise, but pretty soon the monitors will control your electricity at home.

North Carolina is one of the fastest growing states, adding companies, people and jobs.

And with that increasing population comes an increasing need for energy as growth in the Carolinas over the next 15 years is expected to equal the energy output of Maine, Delaware and New Hampshire.

Jeff Brooks with Duke Energy said the new, state-of-the-art energy control center is part of a multi-year effort to modernize, which means more efficiency.

"This facility is all about the future," Brooks said. "It's about preparing for the future. It's about preparing for a future that's going to have greater energy needs than we have today."

"You can just see around the room here all the available information that's available to them," Brooks said. "The old facility didn't have this type of equipment so to have this here and have the ability to have operators communicate quickly with one another, to use smart technology that we have on our system that can help manage demand and manage operations."

Duke will transition away from coal by 2035 so it's using energy sources such as nuclear, natural gas and solar.

Brooks said this will also help prevent rolling blackouts like North Carolina saw last Christmas Eve.

"We've made a lot of improvements not only with our own data but also with other utility data to help make that forecast more accurate," Brooks said. "On top of that as we add more generation resources our goal is to make sure that we can maintain that reliability."

The new center comes online Friday.