Quantcast
Channel: Connecticut News » Tropical Storm Irene
Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 4

AG Urges Regulators To Cut $414M Storm Cost Request From CL&P

0
0

The state’s attorney general urged regulators Friday to cut up to $146 million from Connecticut Light & Power’s request to recover $414 million from ratepayers to pay for storm damages, including the two storms in 2011 and Storm Sandy last year.

Connecticut Light & Power, a division of Northeast Utilities, booked the costs as it brought in thousands of outside tree and line crews, replaced thousands of utility poles and transformers and many miles of wire during the storms. Utilities are allowed to recover the reasonable costs of a major storm, if the company acted prudently in its response to the event.

And if the state approves the entire storm cost, a typical bill — for a residential ratepayer using 700 kWh a month — would rise $3 a month for the next six years, though commercial customers and heavy residential users would likely pay more.

The recommendation to cut the request came as parties in the case filed briefs at the end of a four-month investigation that weighed hundreds of customers complaints, hundreds of questions to the utility and hours of expert testimony.

Attorney General George Jepsen said in a filing with the state Public Utilities Regulatory Authority that the utility’s “imprudence, especially with respect to the Nor’easter, turned extended power outages into crisis situations, caused significant public anxiety and severely impacted residents’ and towns’ abilities to effectively deal with the outages.”

His recommendation is that regulators disallow 30 percent to 50 percent of the company’s costs relating to Tropical Storm Irene and the October Nor’easter because of the utility’s “deficient and inadequate response” to those events.

On top of the cut to the 2011 storm costs, the request filed by CL&P included costs that were improperly incurred or unjustified, and shouldn’t be covered by ratepayers. These include: accounting of deferred income taxes, tree work that was the responsibility of AT&T, management of the company’s storm reserve fund, and the company’s failure to evaluate some damage to substations.

Factoring in those costs, the attorney general’s view is that regulators should reduce the company’s request from $90 million to $146 million, or as much as 35 percent.

In March, CL&P filed its application with ratepayers to recover the costs it incurred during five storms it deemed major in 2011 and 2013, at a costs of $414 million — including $111 million on Irene, $175 million on the October 2011 snowstorm and $156 million on Sandy a year later.

PURA said in August — when it completed its study of the utility’s 2011 restoration efforts — that it would reflect on that performance when deciding whether ratepayers should foot the whole bill. In that report, Art House, the authority’s chairman, said that PURA would be “fair and reasonable” when deciding whether to dock any of the storm costs.

Regulators plan to issue a draft decision in the matter in late December.


Source Article from http://hartfordcourant.feedsportal.com/c/34278/f/623720/s/3332344a/sc/1/l/0L0Scourant0N0Cnews0Cbreaking0Chc0Eclp0Ecost0Ebriefs0E1110E20A13110A10H0A0H910A4940Bstory0Dtrack0Frss/story01.htm


Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 4

Latest Images

Trending Articles



Latest Images