SQL Server

Transact-SQL
11
please click arrow to the left for Drop CREATE Data 
drop table Temp 
go 

create table Temp (id int, Rate nvarchar(500), Value_Expected int)
go 

insert into Temp values
('1', '1 x E1 (L),As above (E1) but xyz (inflated rate),5.77 6 x E10(L),As above (E10) but xyz (vvv rate),1.235 1 x E11(L),As above (E11) but xyz (vvv rate),0.93',14.11),
('2', '1 x E1,"xyz, new spur, xyz/water/xyz (if required), xyz (xyz)",4.67 1 x E10,Day rate per hour,1 ',5.67),
('3', '1 x E1,"z, z, z gas/water/z (if required), z (z)",4.67 1 x E6b,z (z)11 - 20m,2 1 x E6c,z (z) 21 - 30m,3 1 x E7b,xyz (z)11 - 20m,2 1 x E8,z,0.5 2 x E10,z,1 1 x E11,z,0.75',6.34)
go 


select * from Temp 
go

Here's the cursor .. going though character by character ...

declare @string varchar(500) = '' ,  @i int , @Cursor as CURSOR; 
set  @Cursor = cursor for select rate from temp 
open @Cursor; FETCH NEXT FROM @Cursor INTO @string

WHILE @@FETCH_STATUS = 0
	BEGIN
			select @i = 0
				while @i < len(@string)
					begin
						select @i = @i + 1
						select  substring(@string, @i, 1)
					end 
		FETCH NEXT FROM @Cursor INTO @string
	END

CLOSE @Cursor;
DEALLOCATE @Cursor;