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Southern California Edison, former operator of the shuttered San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, claimed yesterday (August 12) that its customers should bear the cost of prematurely shuttering the plant, as reported in the Los Angeles Times.
According to Edison, “If a utility asset must be retired before the end of its expected life, the utility recovers from customers its reasonable investment costs.”
Ratepayers, in fact, have already paid a significant portion of the estimated $4.1 billion decommissioning cost – Edison has collected $2.7 billion from its customers over the years, while clients of San Diego Gas & Electric and the City of Riverside’s electric utility had contributed another $927 million as of December 2012, leaving funding for the retirement of the two remaining reactors about $500 million short.
Even though their liability under a warranty provided to Edison is capped at $138 million, the utility has filed suit against Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, manufacturers of the faulty steam generators that failed, releasing a small amount of radiation into the atmosphere and ultimately leading to the plant’s closure. Edison seeks as much as $2 billion for other losses related to the closure, including the purchase of replacement energy during the plant’s outage.
Southern California Edison, former operator of the shuttered San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, claimed yesterday (August 12) that its customers should bear the cost of prematurely shuttering the plant, as reported in the Los Angeles Times.
According to Edison, “If a utility asset must be retired before the end of its expected life, the utility recovers from customers its reasonable investment costs.”
Ratepayers, in fact, have already paid a significant portion of the estimated $4.1 billion decommissioning cost – Edison has collected $2.7 billion from its customers over the years, while clients of San Diego Gas & Electric and the City of Riverside’s electric utility had contributed another $927 million as of December 2012, leaving funding for the retirement of the two remaining reactors about $500 million short.
Even though their liability under a warranty provided to Edison is capped at $138 million, the utility has filed suit against Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, manufacturers of the faulty steam generators that failed, releasing a small amount of radiation into the atmosphere and ultimately leading to the plant’s closure. Edison seeks as much as $2 billion for other losses related to the closure, including the purchase of replacement energy during the plant’s outage.