Monday, January 10, 2011
Riddle offers bill to foster nuclear power site permit
Rep. Jeanie Riddle, R-Mokane, has introduced legislation that allows Ameren Missouri to recover costs of obtaining an early site permit for a second reactor at the Callaway Nuclear Power Plant.Riddle represents the Callaway County area near Reform where the Callaway Nuclear Power Plant is located.
Freshman Sen. Mike Kehoe, R-Jefferson City, has introduced identical legislation, known as Senate Bill 50, in the Missouri Senate.
Offering identical legislation in both houses of the Missouri General Assembly will give a good reading on how each body views various features of the proposal.
As she begins her second two-year term as a state representative, Riddle learned she has been appointed to the Missouri House Utilities Committee, which will hear the proposed Callaway plant legislation. Riddle rounded up 29 co-sponsors of the legislation, including the chairman and vice chairman of the Utilities Committee, along with nine other members of the committee.
Riddle said she was pleased she was appointed to the Utilities Committee and to the Missouri House Ethics Committee.
Riddle also has been named as the Missouri House majority assistant floor leader, the fourth-highest leadership position in the Missouri House.
Riddle’s proposed nuclear site permit legislation, known as House Bill 124, would allow a utility building a nuclear reactor to recover expenditures for the permit only after the permit is obtained and the recovery costs could be spread over a period of up to 20 years to decrease the impact on rate payers.
Under the proposed legislation, a company receiving an early site permit for a nuclear reactor from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is required to submit reports to the Missouri Public Service Commission every six months. The reports must document the work completed and costs incurred up to that point toward the acquisition of the early site permit as well as the amount of work remaining.
If the cost of the early site permit is expected to exceed $40 million, the company must include an explanation in its reports as to why expenditures beyond the amount are prudent.
Ameren Missouri and a consortium of other Missouri utilities have joined together to support an early site permit at the Callaway plant. The other utilities include Kansas City Power & Light, Empire District Electric, Associated Electric Cooperatives, the Association of Missouri Electric Cooperatives and the Missouri Public Utility Alliance.
Riddle’s bill would allow other electric companies that also incur expenses toward the early site permit to recover their costs through rates and charges.
Under the bill any electric company that has recovered costs from rate payers relating to an early site permit must refund its rate payers up to the amount collected if the early site permit is sold or transferred.
Gov. Jay Nixon has endorsed the move for an early site permit at the Callaway plant. Nixon said the early site permit does not change the initiative-passed measure that prohibits private utilities from charging customers for building a nuclear plant while it is under construction.
Opponents of the proposal already have started television commercials in opposition to the proposed legislation.
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