COLUMBUS - Gov. Ted Strickland yesterday vowed to veto a just unveiled Republican energy regulation plan if it reaches his desk.
"The bill allows immediate and unfettered access for FirstEnergy to go to market, exposing businesses and consumers in Cleveland, Toledo, and Akron to the risk of skyrocketing electricity prices," he said.
FirstEnergy Corp., the Akron-based parent of Toledo Edison, has transferred ownership of its nuclear power plants and other generation facilities to subsidiary FirstEnergy Solutions. Democratic members of the House Public Utilities Committee argued that could allow the utility with the state's highest rates to bypass the bill's intent of having regulatory and market forces compete with each other to ensure that consumers pay lower prices.
"The bill says the phase-in [to an open market] applies to utilities that still have generation, but it never goes on to say what happens to a utility that doesn't have generation," said Ohio Consumers' Counsel Janine Migden-Ostrander, who represents residential consumers in this debate.
It was unclear how that would play out for FirstEnergy customers. While most concede that other utilities in the state are likely to see price increases,
FirstEnergy customers are believed to at least stand a shot at lower prices.
After months of closed-door discussions, House Republicans Thursday unveiled their response to Mr. Strickland and the Senate's plan to deal with how electricity is generated in the state and how much customers should pay for it.........................
http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080412/NEWS24/80...
Instead of storing natural gas for winter use, we are now progressively blowing through such reserves in the summer for electricity generation to help run all our goddamn air conditioners. (Why do to the utilities run NG-fired turbines for summer use? Because it's very profitable.) Then the gas company raises the rates on us for winter even more, since there's a relative shortage.
My point is that regardless of legislative action, the price of energy is going to be higher next year than it is this year. If you don't make a plan for that, then I can only and seriously question your education and intelligence.