Cuomo wrong on nuclear plant bailout: View, Lohud.com Michael Shank October 12, 2016
New York state sets a trap with its plan to boost upstate nuclear plants by tacking on a fee to utility customers’ bills Bailouts are common in government — at the federal and state level and regardless of political party — and that’s what is happening now in New York for the nuclear industry.
New York’s nuclear bailout is merely the latest example of business getting off scot-free while taxpayers pick up multi-billion-dollar tabs. Gov. Andrew Cuomo is planning to bail out the aging and money-losing Ginna, FitzPatrick and Nine Mile Point nuclear plants, some of America’s oldest nuclear plants owned by Exelon and Entergy, with nearly $8 billion of New Yorkers’ hard-earned money (and another $2.8 billion if energy prices fall).
That decision was made after Exelon alone spent $430,000 in lobbying Albany over the past two years. In the same amount of time, Entergy spent $1.7 million lobbying New York state. Money talks…….
The New York nuclear bailout falls into the same trap that riddled financial industry and auto industry bailout schemes. There’s little corrective action that’s encouraged, or regulated, and so the industry is allowed to continue making the same mistakes — all at a significant cost to our economy. Nothing could be more inefficient. The most common nuclear industry bailout props up companies operating old plants — in desperate need of repair, emitting radioactive waste, leaking toxic material often and keeping cooling systems that kill massive amounts of marine life — with no conditions. And it’s done using taxpayer dollars to prop up companies — such as Fortune 100 Company Exelon with $34 billion in annual revenues — that aren’t in need of extra revenue……
Neither New York’s nuclear industry nor the utilities industry should be passing on these costs to taxpayers, nor should state governments be picking up the corporate tab. These are costs that companies should cover, not citizens. http://www.lohud.com/story/opinion/contributors/2016/10/12/cuomo-nuclear-plant-bailout/91945160/
