(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Unless you're off the grid, there's a good chance your electric bill funds killing the planet [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2023-07-06 David Pomerantz, executive director of the Energy and Policy Institute (a utility watchdog organization) has some unsettling news. To avoid the worst impacts of climate change, we have to make two big transitions at once: First, we have to generate all of our electricity from clean sources, like wind turbines and solar panels, rather than power plants that run on coal and methane gas. Second, we have to retool nearly everything else that burns oil and gas — like cars, buses and furnaces that heat buildings — to run on that clean electricity. These changes are underway, but their speed and ultimate success depend greatly on one kind of company: the utilities that have monopolies to sell us electricity and gas. But around the country, utility companies are using their outsize political power to slow down the clean energy transition, and they are probably using your money to do it. State regulators are supposed to make sure that customers’ monthly utility bills cover only the cost of delivering electricity or gas and to set limits on how much utilities can profit. But large investor-owned utilities, with legions of lawyers to help them evade scrutiny, bake many of their political costs into rates right alongside their investments in electrical poles and wires. In doing so, they are conscripting their customers into an unknowing army of millions of small-dollar donors to prolong the era of dirty energy. (from The NY Times, via a link through the paywall.) It’s quite simple. Utilities are de facto monopolies; it’s not like you can sign up with a competitor and have them run a new power line to your house. Sure they may be switching to cleaner energy — but they want to do it on their terms. ...They will support a clean energy transition only if it happens exclusively on their terms and at their pace — a stance at odds with the scope and urgency of the herculean task of decarbonizing our electric grid. Most electric utilities view distributed energy — technologies owned by customers that generate electricity in smaller amounts — as a threat to their business. They have tried for years to stop their customers in many states from investing in rooftop solar by rigging rates to make it less economically attractive. They’ve also funded opposition to policies that would speed clean energy. Florida Power & Light spent millions of dollars on political consultants who are accused of engineering a scheme to siphon votes to third-party ghost candidates, according to reporting by The Orlando Sentinel. The ghost candidates never campaigned, but their names appeared on ballots for competitive State Senate seats in an effort to spoil the chances of Democrats who had been critical of the utilities. One of the Democrats had repeatedly introduced legislation supportive of rooftop solar power, which Florida Power & Light has crusaded against for years, including writing legislation in 2021 that would have slowed its growth. “I want you to make his life a living hell,” the utility’s chief executive wrote in an internal email. The legislator lost by fewer than 40 votes. Florida Power & Light has denied wrongdoing in the ghost candidate scandal. These are not nice people, not to anyone who gets between them and their profits. If that means cooking the planet, well it’s just business. Utilities are supposed to be regulated — but too often the regulators have been captured by the industry. As the block quote above illustrates, they can afford to invest in getting legislators who will protect their interests. And when all else fails, there’s outright bribery and corruption. Things that might make power cleaner and more resilient — like neighborhood micro-grids — have faced opposition. That has to change. More to the point, the more we accelerate moving to clean power, the more the price of doing so comes down. Delay by utilities is actually inflating the transition costs. Read the whole Pomerantz editorial — including the parts about the ways some states are fighting back. If you go to the Energy and Policy Institute website, you can sign up for email notifications. You’ll know the powers that be will not really be serious about the climate emergency so long as utilities are allowed to keep doing this kind of stuff. Given how rapidly the planet is heating up, it can't be allowed to continue unchecked. [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/7/6/2179506/-Unless-you-re-off-the-grid-there-s-a-good-chance-your-electric-bill-funds-killing-the-planet Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/