Southern California Edison on Friday reiterated its support for an agreement on how to divide financial responsibility with consumers over the retirement of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station in northern San Diego County.
The Edison statement came after several officials have called for the agreement with ratepayer advocates, approved by the California Public Utilities Commission, to be scrapped because of alleged backroom dealing.
Opposition to the deal stems from the revelation that former CPUC Chairman Michael Peevey discussed terms with an SCE executive in a hotel room in Poland long before the agreement was finalized.
Friday’s statement from Edison said the meeting did not give the utility any advantage at the negotiating table.
The issue stems from Edison’s decision almost two years ago to retire the reactors at the facility rather than pursue a costly restart procedure. The plant has been idle since a small, non-injury leak in January 2012.
Under the deal the CPUC approved last November, consumers will pay about $3.3 billion over 10 years, which includes paying for power purchased on behalf of customers after the nuclear plant was taken offline.
In exchange, Edison, the majority owner and operator, and San Diego Gas & Electric, which owns 20 percent of the plant, stopped further collection of the steam generator replacement project costs in rates and was to return all such costs collected after Jan. 31, 2012, to ratepayers.
It also would accept a substantially lower return on other prematurely retired San Onofre assets, according to the CPUC.
The commission said those settlement terms will result in consumer credits and refunds worth $1.3 billion.
Two parties to the agreement, the state Office of Ratepayer Advocates and The Utility Reform Network, expressed their outrage about the Poland meeting in separate statements.
However, the ORA and TURN stopped short of calling for the deal to be overturned, because some savings for consumers was achieved and a renegotiated deal might be worse. The organizations said they would be prepared to renegotiate if the CPUC scrapped the deal.
Both called for Edison to be sanctioned, with the ORA specifying an amount of at least $648 million.
— City News Service