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FirstEnergy seeks Federal help to keep nuclear plants operating
- 6 years ago (2018-03-30)
- David Flin
The US power company FirstEnergy has urged the US Federal Government to use emergency powers to help it keep several struggling nuclear and coal-fired plants operating. Critics have described this as an attempt at a corporate bailout.
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FirstEnergy’s FirstEnergy Solutions unit said that without state or federal relief, it would have to shut several plants in Ohio and Pennsylvania. It called on US Energy Secretary Rick Perry to use emergency powers to compel PJM Interconnection, the regional grid operator, to negotiate a contract that would compensate owners of coal and nuclear power plants for benefits such as reliability and jobs offered by those plants.
PJM Interconnection has rejected the need for any emergency order. Vincent Duane, Senior Vice President at PJM, said: “Nothing we have seen suggests there is any kind of emergency from these units retiring. This is fundamentally a corporate issue.”
A spokesman for FirstEnergy Solutions declined to comment on speculation that the unit was heading for bankruptcy, but he directed attention to a filing the company made with the Energy Department. The filing included a comment made in February by Charles Jones, Chief Executive of FirstEnergy, in which he said that he would be “shocked” if FirstEnergy Solutions did not file for some form of bankruptcy protection by the end of March.