Georgia Watch applauds Oglethorpe Power Company for their vote today calling for reasonable protections for rural electric customers and all Georgians!
"We are hopeful that the Southern Company will agree with a proposal to
protect our rural energy consumers in Georgia who should not be responsible for excessive future increases in the costs of this project," said Mike Smith, president and CEO of Oglethorpe Power. "The Southern Company directly owns and controls Southern Nuclear Corporation (SNC), which has control of the site and project oversight of Vogtle 3 and 4. As SNC's owner,
Southern Company should be willing to bear further risk of SNC's missed budgets, not our members."
According to Smith, Oglethorpe Power and its member EMCs believe in nuclear power as a reliable source of clean, carbon-free electric generation that could benefit the region for 60 to 80 years.
However, they recognize it would not be in their electric consumers' best interests to continue building a project with uncapped, unchecked expenses.
"Capping our costs, and by extension the costs borne by our EMC members, is a reasonable request and a prudent business decision that would allow the project to move forward," Smith added.
