The nuclear bailout nobody's talking about

COLUMBUS -- "In February, seven months after Gov. Mike Dewine signed the $1.3 billion ratepayer bailout that mostly would subsidize two Northern Ohio nuclear plants, FirstEnergy might have gotten an even bigger break in U.S. bankruptcy court. That’s when Judge Alan M. Koschik signed off on a settlement that largely excused FirstEnergy from footing part of the bill to clean up the aging nuclear plants in Ohio and another in Pennsylvania that it had bequeathed to to its successor, now known as Energy Harbor, in the event that company goes belly up.

If the new company can’t make a go of it with the nuclear and coal plants that had been owned by FirstEnergy, taxpayers could well be on the hook for whatever part of the estimated $10 billion nuclear cleanup that Energy Harbor and a trust fund it’s required to maintain can’t.

Those are cleanups that, for financial reasons, will take 60 years — decades during which the crumbling cooling tower of the company’s Davis-Besse plant, for example, will loom over the Lake Erie shoreline in view of South Bass Island, one of Ohio’s premier tourist attractions."

-- Marty Schladen, Ohio Capital Journal

read the full article

Ohio GOP lawmakers' big stall in response to alleged HB 6 corruption cannot stand

"HB 6′s nuclear, coal and solar subsidies are due to kick in on Jan. 1, pulling in up to $170 million annually from Ohio ratepayers. Yet in the 12 weeks since the charges were unveiled, what has happened to repeal a bill that even a prime co-sponsor, state Rep. Jamie Callender, a Lake County Republican, acknowledges is tainted and in need of replacement?

In terms of an outcome, not one thing.

A new study committee was set up and has held hearings on HB 6 repeal bills but adjourned until after the election. And it’s unclear whether new House Speaker Robert Cupp, a Lima Republican, has the appetite to move on HB 6-related legislation in the lame-duck session. Democrats are collecting signatures on a discharge petition seeking to force a repeal vote on the floor, but do not yet appear to be close to the 50 signatures needed -- with Cupp still controlling when the House is in session.

And where is the drive to do what the legislature should have done last year -- force Energy Harbor, the firm that owns the two Ohio nuclear plants, and its corporate predecessors, FirstEnergy Solutions and Solutions' former corporate parent, FirstEnergy Corp., to provide proof that a bailout is even needed?

This big stall is not what Ohio ratepayers and voters are entitled to expect from the lawmakers they elect and pay. Ohioans want action. Cupp et. al. need to deliver it."

-- Editorial Board, Cleveland.com & The Plain Dealer 

read more

Columbus Clean Energy aggregation

The City of Columbus is pursuing a community choice aggregation program to meet its goal of providing 100% clean, renewable energy to power residents and small businesses by 2022.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ST8NVpgNWSE&feature=youtu.be

Learn more about community-choice aggregation - Issue 1 on the November 3 ballot