Changes needed to ensure clean energy,
protect ratepayers, groups say
Raleigh—An array of more than
15 leading environmental, consumer, and social justice groups, including AARP
North Carolina, NC Justice Center, and Southern Environmental Law Center, are calling
on House lawmakers to make key changes to S. 3, the energy bill that includes a
blank check for more coal and nuclear power plants along with promotions for
renewable energy sources.
Environmental advocates are
asking House lawmakers to ensure that the bill does not accelerate the
construction of the very plants that renewable energy and energy efficiency
measures are intended to offset.
“Unfortunately, the bill’s
renewable energy benefits are now overshadowed by provisions that would promote
new coal and nuclear plants,” said Elizabeth Ouzts, state director of
Environment North Carolina, one of the groups calling for changes. “We’re
asking House lawmakers to make the Clean Energy bill clean again.”
The state’s investor-owned
utilities lobbied successfully for provisions in the bill that reverse
decades-old policy for financing construction of new power plants. The changes, which allow utilities to pass on
the costs of constructing new plants before those plants are complete, are
drawing fire from consumer groups.
"By shifting the
financial risk for the construction of new power plants to consumers, utilities
will be emboldened to build more dangerous nuclear plants, with more
cost overruns, resulting in higher rates for all North Carolinians." said Rob Thompson of the N.C. Public Interest
Research Group.
Al Ripley, director of NC Justice Center's Consumer Action Network, noted the impact of those
provisions on poor and working class families.
"While all of us will
see a significant bump in our electricity bills, low- and fixed-income
consumers that already struggle to pay their monthly bills are the last people
that should be financing the construction of expensive new power plants,”
said Ripley.
The groups delivered separate
letters—one detailing environmental concerns, the other summarizing consumer
complaints—to all 120 lawmakers in advance of the first hearing of S. 3,
“Promote Renewable Energy/Baseload Generation” in the House Energy and Energy
Efficiency Committee, expected today at noon.
Senate lawmakers moved the complex, 27-page bill through its process in
less than three hours, with little discussion and debate. Advocates are asking for a fuller debate in
the House.
Environmental_Energy_Letter.pdf