Utilities Charging Customers For Coal Clean-Up Face Blowback (1)

摘要

First, states across the U.S. ordered utilities to clean up ponds full of toxic coal waste. Now, they're balking at how much companies want to charge for the work. Officials from Virginia to North Carolina to South Carolina are pushing back on utilities' plans to charge customers for the costs of shuttering coal ash ponds, long the primary way of storing residue from burning the fuel. In a potential blow to Dominion Energy Inc., the staff of Virginia's utility regulator expressed concerns in a filing released May 15 over the company's bid to recover as much as $247 million through monthly bills for cleanup efforts. It's a high-stakes battle for utilities, which have so far escaped any shareholder wrath over cleanup expenses because investors assumed the costs would be baked into customers' rates. Duke Energy Corp. in particular would take a big hit as the utility is estimating costs of as much as $10.6 billion in the Carolinas. Officials there are already challenging more than a half-billion dollars. "Any disallowance could become problematic" for utilities, said Paul Patterson, an analyst with Glenrock Associates. On the flip side, he asked, "How do you do this in a manner that it doesn't become the straw that breaks the camel's back and makes things unaffordable" for customers?