Ed Smith, of the MO Coalition for the Environment, contacted us at Show Me Progress to say that there’s a third side to the argument about building another nuclear plant at Callaway County. The Coalition, alongside representatives from Walmart, Sierra Club, Missourians for Safe Energy and Missouri Votes Conservation (yes THE Walmart, to speak of strange bedfellows), flat out opposes any public funding help for Ameren in building a second nuclear plant.
I wrote last week about the opposition of a coalition led by Sen. Joan Bray to Governor Nixon’s proposal that ratepayers ante up $40 million to help Ameren apply for a license for that plant. Bray’s group opposes giving Ameren the money but feels that the political reality is (or at least was) that the Republican legislature would grant the funds. Therefore, Fair Energy Rate Action Fund (FERAF), led by Bray, is working to get something in return for that sacrifice, namely that the Office of Public Counsel would be funded by profits from utilities rather than by the state and that the OPC would get more funding, which it could use to oppose building another nuclear plant.
Charles Jaco interviewed Smith and gave him the opportunity to explain that nuclear power is very expensive, not to mention dangerous (think, Japan and then New Madrid fault line), and that coal is dirty. But if Missourians focused on improving their energy efficiency, we could save so much power over the next twenty years that not only would a new nuclear plant be unnecessary, but that the dirtiest coal plant Ameren operates could be closed down. Smith sees giving Ameren the forty Mill as the camel’s nose: a way of chipping away at the anti-CWIP law, the law that forbids making ratepayers finance new facilities before they actually come on line.
No doubt, Senator Bray understands and agrees with Smith’s arguments. Her group just didn’t want to lose the battle and have nothing to show for the effort. But now? It will be interesting to see how much or whether the danger of nuclear meltdowns in Japan changes the “fix is in” mentality in Jeff City on this issue. If that were to happen, FERAF and the Coalition might find themselves presenting a united front against the new plant.
This has got to be the most stupid proposition I have heard of in many a year. The tax payers/rate payers are to hand off a big lump of their own money to finance something, a government study of the feasibility of the building of a nuclear power plant that we don’t want and probably don’t need, that can only benefit (profit) the electric company…if it is approved. I presume that approval would mean the public gets to kick in more money for the construction and operation of this monstrosity with no return on “investment” to the public and no reduction in rates. If it is not approved, then we are just out the original “investment” with, again, no money back on this deal. Given that what they want the money for is something that is likely to hurt us economically, if not turn us all into crispy critters, why in the name of Zeus would anyone be for this unless that person is getting a pocket full of “green”. I don’t know who is dumber, the politicians who make these deals or the people who vote them into office.
genepool – you answered your own question. A handful of corporations own our state and national governments, and, by extension, they own us. Follow the money.
I agree this proposal is insane and am totally disgusted that Gov. Nixon would even consider such an idiotic plan. A friend of mine who works for Ameren Missouri has been invited to their main office to look at the solar panels on the roof. They put several different kinds up there to see which ones work best (yeah, right.) They want to make us think they really are going to do something with alternative energy while at the same time backing a legislative repeal of the law passed by initiative of the voters requiring 20% of energy come from alternative sources by a certain date. It’s all a hoax. The fix IS in, and, with corporate pimps in the state legislature and U.S. Congress, we’re screwed.