Just when I think power company corporate flacks can't get any stupider, they've managed to top themselves.

In this article in The Columbus Dispatch, AEP's Little Drummer Boy threatens to take his toys and stomp off Ohio's playground unless he gets his way.  WAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH, LDB, WAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

This is just the latest comedic moment in a long-running freak show that's been playing out in Ohio over the past year.  A Dispatch reporter got interested in electric rates when AEP filed a rate case in Ohio last year.  The more he found out, the worse it began to smell.  Ohio's Public Utilities Commission (PUCO) has been completely captured by the companies it regulates, and the appointed Commission is stacked with corporate lackeys.  The Governor furthered the corruption by cutting the Ohio Consumer Counsel's budget in half last fall.  The stage was set perfectly for what happened next.

When the rate case turned into a privately negotiated settlement that some parties, such as the Office of Consumer Counsel, refused to sign, The Dispatch reporter got even more curious and wrote a string of articles about the corruption at PUCO.  The Dispatch also used FOIA to access internal PUCO documents and correspondence about the rate case and settlement.  The Dispatch took what they'd won in the FOIA and consulted ratemaking experts.  Turns out that during the settlement, an inequitable share of a new distribution rider was allocated to the small business, school, church rate class that resulted in bills doubling for these customers.  Incidentally, this class of ratepayers were not represented in the settlement, however the large industrial customers who were represented came out of it with a corresponding decrease in the amount they would pay for the distribution rider.  The Dispatch published the results of their investigation, warning small businesses and others in this class that their rates would go up 30 - 40% if the settlement was approved.  They also published quotes from PUCO internal emails where staff had pointed this out early on in the process.  In fact, one PUCO staff person pretty accurately predicted the ultimate outcome.  Despite this, PUCO went ahead and approved the settlement.

When rates went into effect in January, and small businesses started getting their bills, a public relations storm erupted.  PUCO was hit with over 1,000 complaints, small businesses were facing layoffs and closures.  In response to the possibility of having the flaming bag placed on their doorstep, PUCO rescinded approval of AEP's settlement and rate increase last week.  AEP's stock tanked 5%.  PUCO pointed the finger at AEP for gouging customers without their knowledge.
Read The Columbus Dispatch's coverage of all this here.

Instead of falling gracefully on their sword, AEP pointed the finger back at PUCO and demanded that they reinstate the part of the settlement that allows them to limit the competition that's kicking their deregulated generation rear end in the state.  AEP wants this immediately, or they're going to move their headquarters out of Ohio and cause massive job loss.

Hahahahahahahahahaaa!  Hysterical!  I guess some corporate PR genius was still sniffing the fumes of their successful snow job of WV's Senate Judiciary Committee last week, where the threat of job loss was used to get their own way.  Really dumb move.  LDB looks like a pouty pre-schooler and nobody really seems to care if he stomps off, in fact they are welcoming him to do so.

Buh-bye, AEP!  Don't make threats you don't intend to carry out.  Tony the Trickster and his merry band of wanna-be corporate pirates are batting their eyelashes at PUCO, wanting to be their next darling and take your place.  Apparently, nobody's going to miss you much.

SB162, Least Cost Planning, died in committee today.  So ends my involvement with legislation this year.  Now I can get back to the things I do best, like, oh I don't know... maybe researching and reporting on corporate campaign donations?

Many thanks to the many of you who made phone calls and wrote emails.  Once again, our collective efforts produced the biggest response to a piece of legislation and made our corporate representatives at the Capitol distinctly uncomfortable.  Unfortunately, it wasn't enough to drown out the "free speech" of the electric and coal corporation campaign cash.  This will most likely continue until we hold "our" elected representatives accountable for their actions and make them earn our respect.  As my poor mother was fond of saying many years ago, "I brought you into this world, and I can take you out!"  The current status quo will only survive as long as you allow it.  The power is in your hands.

So, the next time your electric rates go up (hey, that's this Thursday for you ApCo customers -- they're going to file for ANOTHER rate increase), you can send your personal thanks to the members of Senate Judiciary who tabled the least cost planning bill.  It turns out that the problem was that the coal companies were scared that when their power company friends were forced to put real numbers on a public piece of paper, maybe coal wouldn't be the cheapest fuel to generate electricity going forward.  Therefore, the corporations and their friends in the Senate decided it was better to kill the bill and hope that the consumers never find out that their electric bills keep going up in order to subsidize West Virginia's coal industry.

This is far from the end for least cost planning, however, it merely served as a launch pad.  There's much more to come!

On the positive side, we scored a huge victory in the House by limiting Appalachian Power's Consumer Debt Bond Bill to only one bailout for the company.

Sometimes the victory is immediate and obvious.  Sometimes it's a long term process, but a victory all the same.

Heroes

Del. Nancy Guthrie, who amended Appalachian Power's Consumer Debt Bond Bill to limit it to a one-time occurrence to bail APCo out of its current precarious situation.

Sen. Dan Foster, who sponsored the Least Cost Planning bill and continued to support it to the bitter end.

Zeros

Well now, that just wouldn't be "nice," would it? ;-)  I don't really need to put a list of names here, do I?

There are so many power company skeletons rattling around in the closet, it's hard to keep track of them all.  While researching a current project, I came across a mid-2009 article, "Solving the System Overload," in a publication called "WV Executive," which was written by one of Allegheny Energy's henchmen.  When I went to save it, I found that I'd already saved it way back in the fall of 2010, and then forgot about it.  I don't remember what I originally intended to do with it, but the perspective of another 18 months renders the article absolutely hilarious.

Haney is so serious with his propaganda... did people actually drink his KoolAid in 2009?  The article promotes Allegheny Energy's TrAIL and PATH projects and is complete and utter crap.  Projections, "facts" and doomsday claims made in this article never existed in reality, and never came true.  You cannot believe ANYTHING power companies tell you, the evidence is right here.

All that claimed "increased demand" for electricity in the opening paragraphs had petered out long before this article was written, thanks to a tanking economy, increased efficiency and demand resources on the east coast.  Haney knew that when he wrote this propaganda.

TrAIL and PATH were all about increased use of coal to power the east coast.  That much is clear in the article.

"TrAIL will also benefit the West Virginia economy over the long term by expanding markets for local coal and allowing for potential new generation projects, including clean-coal technologies and renewable sources such as wind."

Bet they're not so proud of themselves now...

Haney also touts his astroturf front group, West Virginians for Reliable Power.  Turns out that was all a big, expensive scam that electric consumers paid for.  There was no "coalition" of independent entities, it was a marketing scam engineered and directed by Allegheny Energy and its public relations contractor.  But, go ahead and "see what the coalition is saying" by visiting the website Haney touts in his article.  Real grassroots activists have taken over due to a screw up on the Allegheny Energy end.

Lots of garbage promoting Allegheny Energy's new transmission headquarters in the green box on page 2.  The headquarters was part of the buy off of WV Governor Joe Manchin in exchange for needed approval by the WV-PSC.  It wasn't even finished before FirstEnergy took over and turned it into a "regional headquarters" for their Mon Power subsidiary, though.

How about all those jobs that supposedly flow from construction of one of these transmission lines?  The truth is right here in the article -- those jobs go to specialized contractors from out of state and the "jobs" that the locality benefits from are: 

"The economic impact of the construction activity benefits communities along the line, where local businesses provide lodging, meals, supplies and services for field workers."

So unless those union workers in PA & NJ, who recently testified about how badly they need jobs at the NPS EIS hearings, are members of the Motel6/McDonalds workers' union, there won't be any jobs for them flowing from the Susquehanna-Roseland project either.

Haney promotes PATH by sharing that it will, "...create opportunities to upgrade existing transmission facilities to increase their capacity. The current system is so heavily loaded that it is not possible to take the lengthy outages necessary to re-conductor overburdened lines."

Ooops... that turned out to be an outright lie.  PATH has been "suspended" and Dominion has recently taken Mt. Storm-Doubs out of service while it rebuilds the line, and my lights haven't even blinked.  I'm sure yours haven't either.

“The PATH project is vital to the reliability of the electricity grid serving this region,” says Michael Morris, AEP chairman, president and chief executive officer. “It is critical that we reinforce the transmission infrastructure to ensure we can continue to supply reliable electrical service 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.”

Mikey, Mikey, Mikey... it wasn't "vital" at all, was it?  It was just another expensive, unneeded boondoggle that AEP has now swept under the rug.  However, I'm sick and tired of continuing to pay for your mistake.  Give up and abandon this white elephant once and for all.

If you've been wondering about the identity of the "mystery" administrator that has already been spending money that's being added to your electric bill, wonder no more.

Susquehanna-Roseland transmission line partners PSE&G and PPL announced in their comments on the National Park Service's Draft Environmental Impact Statement earlier this week that they will "mitigate" for the permanent damage their new transmission line causes to the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area and the Appalachian Trail by way of a $30 - 40M "endowment" to "a not-for-profit organization with demonstrated expertise in land and resource conservation and successful collaboration with the Department of the Interior."  They also share that they "have engaged and provided funds to a nationally respected land conservation organization to begin acquiring interests in private properties of high value to the Department of the Interior’s conservation mission in the area around DEWA, MDSR, APPA and Cherry Valley National Wildlife Refuge."

It looks like PSE&G and PPL have quite a perverted definition of the word "respected".

According to this NPS document, Internal Scoping Meeting Report. Susquehanna to Roseland Transmission Line Proposal And Right-of-Way Request. Environmental Impact Statement from October 2009, one of the "Action" (as opposed to "No Action", or denial) alternatives to be considered was an "Alternative that outlines the proposal with a framework for mitigation based on a conservation plan being developed in conjunction with The Nature Conservancy."

Despite PSE&G & PPL's attempts to be coy, it's obvious that their purported "respected land conservation organization" is the infamous corporate greenwasher, The Nature Conservancy.

Who is The Nature Conservancy, other than one of America's most prolific junk mailers?  (Thanks for all those free address labels your contributors pay for -- I like to write nasty comments about The Nature Conservancy next to their logo before use.)

The Nature Conservancy describes themselves as "sleeping with the enemy" (well, someone is certainly getting screwed here, and it's not The Nature Conservancy), or as practicing "Development by Design".  Others opine that, "Perhaps TNC should turn itself into a for-profit, environmental mitigation company. Then again, perhaps it already has." 

The Nature Conservancy receives mediocre ratings from charity watchdog groups, with 14% of annual income spent on "administrative costs".  Let's see, 14% of $40M is $5.6M of additional costs you will pay in your electric bill to fund The Nature Conservancy's fat cats like CEO Mark Tercek, who pulled in $493,993 in compensation in 2009.  You'll also be supporting the other 22 officers, directors, trustees and key employees who make up their highest compensated employees.  On this list are 3 individuals making between $400 - 500K, 6 making between $300 - 400K, 12 making between $200 - 300K and 2 bringing home between $100 - 200K. See The Nature Conservancy's 2009 IRS Form 990 here.

But that's chump change in comparison to the real swindle going on here.  What The Nature Conservancy does is buy up private land "for conservation" at a reasonable price, then resell it at a much higher price to the federal, state or local government for use as a park, nature preserve, recreation area, etc.  That's where they make their real money.  So, if we look at the Susquehanna-Roseland bribe through this lens, it is also the taxpaying citizens of the United States who get screwed in this deal because The Nature Conservancy is playing the part of the well-heeled front man, or real estate broker, for the power companies and the National Park Service, who will eventually buy this land from The Nature Conservancy to complete the "mitigation."  How much will the federal government eventually spend as the ultimate purchaser of the $40M of "mitigation" land from The Nature Conservancy, in order to complete the deal to expand the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area?  Or will this land, paid for in your electric bill, be "donated" to the NPS by The Nature Conservancy?  That part isn't clear, but my guess is that The Nature Conservancy doesn't do anything for free.  But, of course, PSE&G and PPL are still keeping the details of this "deal" under wraps.  If it was such a great deal for the public, they'd be so proud of it that they'd be anxious to show it off, don't you think?

As a comparison, a truly "nationally respected" conservation organization would be The Sierra Club, but then again, The Sierra Club would never accept corporate blood money.  Although some have told me my opinion is "wrong," I have yet to be persuaded to change it.  However, in an effort to provide for the free flow of different opinions, here's a link to a Time magazine blog post about the recent brouhaha regarding Sierra Club's past acceptance of millions from Chesapeake.  Further, I'm really not a fan of how this is being spun to portray the WV Coal Association as a poor, downtrodden victim. If this outs me as "not a true environmentalist," so be it.  As well, I am opposed to fracking, but this isn't a fracking blog, so let's get back on topic.  If you want to continue this off-topic conversation, you're free to email me.

The National Park Service employees are being turned into stooges and their EIS process is being utilized as cover for a big money swindle of electric consumers taking place between the politically appointed Director of the Interior, Ken Salazar, and Susquehanna-Roseland project sponsors PSE&G and PPL, with the assistance of corporate greenwasher, The Nature Conservancy.  The Nature Conservancy's part in this charade involves "administration" of PSE&G and PPL's "mitigation" purchase of inferior quality parcels of land on the fringes of the current parks as a consolation prize to the citizens of the United States, who will lose the most scenic vistas of their park to an unnecessary electric transmission line.  For 61 million of these citizens in the PJM Region, insult will be added to injury by having the cost of the $40M bribe (plus 12.93% interest) added to their electric bill for the next 50 years.  This is outrageous!

Almost 10 years ago, The Washington Post did an expose of the corruption going on at The Nature Conservancy, which triggered a Senate investigation and caused them to pretend to clean up their act for a short time.

Range magazine also did a piece about The Nature Conservancy, with the opinion, "Unless we as a people are willing to accept the continued loss of not only private property and individual rights, but of large portions of our national culture and customs as well, the Nature Conservancy must be brought to heel. Right now, it is a well-fed and generally admired beast leading us in a wild run that is as destructive in its seemingly friendly character as it is in its seldom-seen attacks. This is no errant clumsy puppy we can finally calm. It is a runaway predator that will turn on us in defense of its territory. The Nature Conservancy is the wolf we raised ourselves, the grizzly we fed from the table. The monster we made with indifference. If it is left to go on growing, it will be the master and we the obedient slaves."  And again, I'm told I'm "wrong" for including this link.  I do realize there is an agenda at work in this article, however, it does a nice job of unmasking The Nature Conservancy's scam and their continued attack on private property rights.  I am a fierce defender of private property rights, but if you believe in the taking of private property to serve some other party's idea of a higher purpose, you're certainly entitled to that opinion.  Just don't try taking my property on that basis, because you'll have a fight on your hands.

The excellent Range piece talks about The Nature Conservancy's board and trustees, comprised of corporate bigwigs, like Anne E. Hoskins, PSE&G's federal and state governmental affairs director (i.e., political schmoozer).

The Nature Conservancy is like a toilet:  Every now and then it needs to be thoroughly scrubbed and flushed.

Grab your brush!

After running into a buzzsaw in federal court, the DOE and their investor owned utility pets are trying again to "fix" what they call "the stalled transmission policy process created in the 2005 Energy Policy Act."

What they really mean is that they haven't been successful in subverting state authority so that they can site money-making new transmission projects.  Last fall, DOE & FERC, assisted by industry lobbyists, cooked up a scheme to federalize transmission siting.  They got caught and slapped by the states and members of Congress, and supposedly dropped their plan to give authority to designate NIETCs to FERC.  However, the plan lives on.

The 2012 "congestion study" now underway can best be summed up by this quote:

"The effect of the new plan would be to allow transmission developers or other industry participants to propose transmission congestion responses that would be incorporated into DOE-designated corridors."

In other words... allowing greedy corporations to tell them where they wish to site a transmission line, and then DOE will designate a "congestion corridor" to go along with the corporation's proposal.

Cart.  Horse.

DOE - not the brightest bulb in the string...

"It was euphoric for me to be with the regulators and see the light bulbs go off when they realized some of the information they hadn't been getting," she said. "This process helped to give them that data."

Amen, brother!  Tell it like it is!

Pssst... Hey, AEP, they're talking about Y-O-U!

Grist Article:  Once more, from the top: Shutting down dirty coal plants won’t cause blackouts

Wondering why your AEP subsidiary electric bills keep going up?  Wonder no more!  This article regarding a  chat Morningstar had with AEP's Little Drummer Boy and other "senior management" at a recent financial conference reveals, again, what comes out of the other side of AEP's corporate mouth.  It's all about the money, boys!

New EPA rules won't be a problem, according to what AEP management told Morningstar.  In fact, "AEP already has said it could close up to 6 GW of its coal plants, but its highest-margin plants are well-positioned to capture profits for shareholders that it previously had to return to ratepayers."

Compare this to what The Little Drummer Boy said when he testified before Congress on October 13, 2011 (EPA whining starts on Page 8, past the Mountaineer CCS and Turk Plant doublespeak).  LDB is very concerned about how rising electric rates caused by new EPA rules will affect AEP's poor customers!  Well, cry me a river, Nick.

Looks like the Little Drummer Boy is getting off to a bang-up start in the doublespeak category.  Maybe Mikey should give him lessons in perfecting technique while he's breathing down his neck in the future.  Or maybe it was really LDB's evil twin testifying before Congress or talking to Morningstar?  Could one person really contradict themselves that much and still expect to be taken seriously?

A friend sent me a message today alerting me that our old pal Pinky has won an award for his campaign to sacrifice more West Virginia citizens' land, health and future for out-of-state corporate profits.  Wow!  Congratulations, Pinky, we are so proud of you!  Keep it up and maybe someday someone will create a Pinky fan club on facebook just for you!

See what Pinky won here.  Be sure to congratulate Vice-President Pinky while you're there... and also satisfy your sweet tooth on the over-the-top, cutsie-poo, imbecile fest that is CRA.

The message I received also commented on Pinky's legendary fashion sense.  It was noted that he's still got that ultra-chic look that screams, "a trailer park yard sale threw up on me!" 

Let's hope Pinky milks plenty of cash out of IOGA while the Marcellus gas craze lasts because you just never know who's going to end up holding the bag the next time CRA gets fingered in a major screw-up that makes their client less than pleased.

Contradictions.  That's the trouble with doublespeak; inconvenient and pesky contradictions keep popping up, such as this glaring faux pas in a Richmond Times Dispatch op-ed by PJM blowhard Michael Kormos.

"In the case of offshore wind projects, located miles off the coast, lines will be needed to move the electricity from the generators to the onshore grid."

But then:

"New transmission lines will be needed to move electricity from renewable sources — many in remote locations, far from existing transmission lines — across multiple states to the urban areas where the power is needed."

Whoa, there, buddy.  Why would new transmission lines crossing multiple states be needed to move offshore renewables to the onshore grid?  Last time I checked, there weren't any states located in the Atlantic Ocean.

Can't quite decide if that 800-pound industry lobbyist gorilla that lurks in the corner at PJM Interconnection is going to insist that East Coast population centers be forced to have their "public policy" goals met by Midwest wind located a thousand miles away?  Or will the big East Coast energy companies prevail and get rich on the offshore wind right on their doorstep?

"The FERC, which provides regulatory oversight for regional transmission organizations (RTOs), recognizes the problem and recently issued an order related to what can be done to ease building transmission lines that aren't strictly for reliability and providing for those who benefit from those lines to help pay for them."

Oversight?  You mean like that really cool babysitter you had back in elementary school that let you jump on the bed and make prank phone calls to the local pharmacy to ask them if they had Prince Albert in a can?    So, the overly permissive FERC babysitter is going to make it easier to build unneeded transmission lines for other reasons, which are going to end up so muddled that it will be impossible to properly allocate costs or challenge a subjective planning process.  Also, those who benefit from them will help pay for them... with the rest of us who don't benefit from them picking up the bulk of the tab, right?  That's awfully nice of PJM and FERC, don't you think?  I'm sure I'm not the only one who sees a trip to the judicial fun house in the making.  You know, sometimes when you insist on having too much of a good thing, you end up with nothing at all.

And not to change the subject, but that Governor's Conference on Energy isn't about renewables, is it?  Check out the "sponsors" here, and then check out the prices for sponsorship.  For the cost of all those "receptions" and "meals," check out the price list for how much those "sponsorships" cost here.  Yeah, Virginia is for lovers, and lobbyists, and coal companies, and coal burners, and gas companies, and oil companies, and public relations propaganda, and front groups.  What?  Front groups?  How shocking!  I'm certain the Governor's office didn't knowingly endorse industry front groups Faces of Coal and Virginians for Reliable Energy by permitting them to "sponsor" his conference!  Of course not!  The muck is getting pretty deep, I hope the conference participants brought their hip-waders...