Clean Energy Bill tainted

As many of you have heard, the Clean Energy Bill is passing through the House and Senate. Compliance with the requirements is mandated by penalties if utilities do not meet the new standard by a specific date. Section 8 (1) states “An electric utility that fails to comply with sections 3 and 4 of this act shall pay a penalty to the state of Washington…” The good news is that penalties may not be passed on to ratepayers of investor-owned utilities (IOUs) like Avista.

Section 8 (2) states “a utility may opt to make a payment in the amount of the administrative penalty as an alternative compliance payment, without incurring a penalty for noncompliance.” The bad news is that alternative compliance payments are not penalties. They can be passed on to ratepayers as a cost of doing business with a 7.5 percent return on equity add-on. This discourages compliance and encourages utilities, especially IOUs, to pass the non-compliance cost on to rate payers and make a profit.

This interpretation was confirmed by a state representative yesterday and is a classic example of political corruption. How long are we going to stand for this?

Michael Bell

Nine Mile Falls